CHIT-CHAT™ by Geoyce Chatman

Post-Obama Apocalypse

2011-03-09T23:50:00.000-08:00

PREVIOUS POST RE-POSTED:

My grandfather died today. He didn’t live to see the end of the play. I’d hoped it would all end in time for him to know that he and all the others who brought this about had been forgiven, their sins expunged, their penitence served. I know I should burn his collection of Obama memorabilia, but it’s all I have left of him. He could never bring himself to get rid of it, even when it was banned and anyone found possessing such materials could be arrested and imprisoned. Luckily, his cache of buttons, coins, posters, T-shirts, and books were well hidden – not in an attic or basement where they’d be easily found. These things have been buried under a tree for forty years. I dug them up a few days ago at his request. He wanted to tell me the story. I’ve heard it all before, but he wanted me to understand how he and his contemporaries let it happen.

“He was hope,” Grandpa said, looking at a photo of the deposed President on a campaign poster. “He made us proud to be American, to be black, to be men. Every word he said, everything he did was seen as divinely inspired by many of us. We thought God sent him to save our country and our people. Even after all the expansive programs he created started to fail, many of us believed in him. Some still believed in him when he left office in disgrace.” Grandpa paused not wanting to talk about the tawdry scandal that ended the first black presidency and that made Clinton’s dalliance with an intern look tame by comparison. In his former profession as a journalist, Grandpa said he and his colleagues joked that Clinton’s mistake was having sex with a woman. However, in early twenty-first century America where the religious African-American community that voted down same-sex marriages in California, Ohio, and several other states, there was little tolerance for “alternative” lifestyles, regardless of who lived them. Skipping the scandal, Grandpa talked about what happened just before and right after Obama left office.

“We accepted martial law as necessary because of the crime that ensued when
police officers were laid off as city after city was decimated by debt and the failed
economy, particularly in the President's hometown, Chicago. People had stopped
fearing terrorist attacks following the annihilation of Pakistan and Afghanistan by
Obama-ordered nuclear attacks. Although those attacks pushed Iran and Korea to
arm themselves with nukes and inflamed other Muslim nations, as well as China
and Russia, Al Qaeda, radical jihadists, and terrorist cells were disabled.” I
remembered reading in my history books that Obama was heralded a hero when
Ben Laden’s body was found among the radioactive rubble, causing even
uncertain European allies to approve of the destruction of the two countries where
the terrorists lived and trained for their attacks against the West. “Everyone was
prepared for retaliation from Iran, China, Russia, or North Korea, but it didn’t come
for decades," Grandpa said, continuing his historical account.

“Instead, due to budget cuts in cities all over the country, America was overrun by
criminals who were often jobless, hungry young people who had no hope and
robbed people on the street in broad daylight, using clubs, knives, and illegally
purchased guns. Gun bans didn’t help and only disarmed law-abiding citizens. We
demanded protection as more and more people were gunned down for a few
dollars. We didn’t blink when the cameras were installed to monitor every street
and alley or when the curfews were imposed. We felt it was necessary. Even
when the military was sent into police the streets after being brought home from
Iraq and Afghanistan, we thought it was for our protection. When they started
searching our homes to see if we had guns, we still felt secure because most law-
abiding citizens had turned theirs in as ordered by law. Then the protests started,
at first just on the internet. Later, I found out anyone who sent or received any of the anti-Obama emails was put on a list of ‘subversives’ by the FBI.

"My name was on that list because your great aunt sent an email to my dad who
sent it to me. But it was my editorial that disagreed with but supported anti-Obama
forces’ right to dissent that moved me up to the top rung of the list. I was just
defending free speech, but it wasn’t long before people were being arrested for
speaking out. My website was one of the first taken down as freedom of the press
was completely eroded. Online newspapers and magazines that even questioned
the President’s policies disappeared suddenly and those that openly opposed him,
not only disappeared but their creators were tracked down and arrested. Yet, as
soon as one website was destroyed, another one was created and the online
protests continued, despite efforts to either control or even destroy the internet.
Years after Obama’s exile, it was revealed that he’d ordered the destruction of the
medium used to spread his message of hope during his Presidential campaign.
Public protests, meanwhile, were outlawed and all unauthorized assemblies were
stopped by the military that arrested those who organized these events, spoke at
them, attended them, wrote about them, or even observed them.

"People started disappearing and there were rumors that some were imprisoned
and tortured and others executed. All were called ‘enemy combatants.’ The Patriot
Act, which many had hoped Obama would repeal, was strengthened so that every
constitutional right Americans had vehemently fought for, including the right to
vote, was revoked.” Grandpa paused, his face contorted in pain as he
remembered the nightmare he’d lived and that was now our nation’s history.
“America had turned into a fascist government and Obama was its ruler. Just
when he sat posed to pass a law that would make him ‘ruler for life,’ after
outlawing elections due to ‘potentially unruly mobs’ gathering at polling places, the
scandal was leaked by his most loyal press sycophants who didn’t have the
restrictions that had been placed on the ‘less friendly’ media. Despite those
restrictions and heavy monitoring of the internet, the story got out, although it was
never reported on the broadcast news, which continued to spew Gibbs’
propaganda showing Obama with his children and his dog, despite having leaked
the story in the first place.

"Once the scandal broke, black people took to the streets in numbers so large, the
protests couldn’t be ignored. Even after the water hosing and tazzing started,
others joined these anti-Obama protests. Finally, after months of using military
tactics to attack his own citizens and creating anti-American sentiment throughout Europe, Obama was forced to step down by his own military leaders. However,
once Biden was sworn in to finish out Obama’s term, the military stepped down as
the law enforcers in the country. Obama’s final speech to the nation was so bitter
and unremorseful, people booed their TVs.” I recalled having to learn that speech
in school as an example of the result of the corruption of power. “His wife had
already left him and returned to Chicago with his children. She was given a speedy
divorce and by the time he boarded that plan with Oprah Winfrey, he was no
longer married to Michelle. No one was surprised when he married Winfrey and
her billions, safely in a Swiss bank account, or when he used her power and
money to take over the African nation that became their home in exile.

"Most Americans weren’t even surprised when the Obamas joined the anti-
American nations once called the axis of evil by George Bush, the President
before Obama whose approval rating was the second lowest in history when he
left office. We were surprised, however, that the fascism Obama put in place
continued after he was gone. We supported the clean sweep of the Obama
administration and the indictment of those who helped put him in office. Biden selected Hillary Clinton as his Vice, and they started dismantling the military
control of federal government and returning control to the three branches of
government. Once the Obama political team was imprisoned, Congress went after
the journalists that were in the tank for Obama during and after the election,
dismantling the news organizations of all three major networks and CNN. Fox had
long been demolished by the Obama administration following a long feud that
began when they refused to air his speech to a joint session of Congress in the
summer of 2009. The only broadcast news network allowed to continue was
CNBC. Americans demanded the heads of those who’d supported Obama:
Matthews, Olberman, and Maddow from MSNBC and Martin, Braziel, Borgia,
Cooper, and Blitzer from CNN, in much the same way they went after Congress
members who voted for the Iraq War they supported.” Grandpa’s voice was a little
bitter as he paused reflecting the demise of his chosen profession.

“Journalism and journalists were outlawed with the people’s approval because it
was believed that we put Obama in office by convincing people that he was the
man they believed him to be. They were right, of course. It was the media that
overlooked his faults, never reporting his rants against anyone that criticized or
opposed him, even though we all knew about them and sometimes even
witnessed them. I saw him at the 2008 Democratic Convention making up to his
wife onstage after his acceptance speech and wondered about it, then later found
out from a fellow journalist that he lit into her earlier because their youngest
daughter had talked over his scripted dialog when he was shown watching
Michelle’s speech with a family in another location. Of course no one blamed
Michelle for supporting her husband. Many even suggested she suffered from
battered wife syndrome and women all over the world applauded her when she left
him after finding out about his clandestine double life. When she ran as Hillary’s
vice, it was a sure thing. No media hype was needed to elect the two spouses of
the Presidents who’d put the country through the biggest two scandals since Nixon
and Watergate.

"They were sympathetic figures, matching the mood and temperament of the
nation and they were a shoe-in for election. Each served her eight years
gracefully, repealing any of the laws remaining that took away our rights and
restoring our democracy. Clinton commuted the sentences of the imprisoned
journalists, the very ones who’d brought her down when she ran against Obama.
However, neither President was able to restore America’s faith in the media, and
journalists are still regarded with disdain and distrust. Anyone and anything
associated with Obama is still loathed in this country. I think the Obama
memorabilia is outlawed in deference to former President Michelle Robinson. But I
want you to keep this so you can remember that it wasn’t a scam. We really
believed in him. I know it was wrong of us not to tell the public the truth about him.
We knew about his trysts and the rumors about the men from Rev. Wright’s
church who knew about his secret life that turned up dead. We just wanted to
keep his image pure. We just wanted to believe.”

I listened to my grandfather, trying to hide my own shame of being related to one
of the journalists who helped elect Obama. I didn’t succeed because my
grandfather looked at me pleading for understanding and absolution. He didn’t get
either from me. How can I forgive him? I’ve been drafted to fight in the war against
Obama and his allies, a war being waged on American soil. I will be going to boot
camp in less than a week, then on to California to try to keep the enemies from
advancing. That state is completely occupied by the enemy. Seismologists say the
heavy mortar fire has created conditions for a massive earthquake. Luckily, my
relatives in Northern California got out before the attacks from China and North
Korea. They say they wanted to put America out of the movie business after that
documentary about the downfall of Obama was released last year and distributed
worldwide, making over a quadrillion dollars. That say it’s just propaganda. Obama
should know. It was propaganda that elected him and allowed him to almost
become a dictator. Now, he and several Muslim nations, along with Russia are
said to be preparing to invade the East Coast, which will divide our troops between
the two coasts in defense of our nation.

I will bury my grandfather tomorrow and all of his Obama relics with him.
Hopefully, some day someone will find those pieces of history and understand
what I cannot.

July 4, 2048

Isn't African-American History Just American History?

2011-02-20T15:10:00.000-08:00

The pages of history though printed in black ink have few black faces. Our American story is not only black and white, but red and yellow and brown, olive, and tan. It is a story of people who always came here looking for more. More space. More freedom. More opportunity. While some Africans came here free men and women, my African ancestors came here, not of their own free will, but as slaves. They did the hard labor, alongside redskinned captives and white indentured servants and; later as share croppers, they labored alongside yellow and brown migrants and white immigrants.

Our story is a story of commonfolk who worked hard and made fortunes or just had ordinary lives rearing children and leaving a legacy of independence and
defiance in the face of many obstacles. African-American History Month
celebrates the achievements of those edited out of history or who're listed as a
footnote. While it includes the accomplishments of a few celebrated people of
darker hue, e.g., Dr. Martin Luther, Jr., King, Rosa Parks, President Obama; it is
the story of the inventors, educators, scientists, musicians, athletes, soldiers,
ministers, statesmen and common men and women who did uncommon things
and are only recognized once a year during this month. Their names should be in
the history books along with the names of Native Americans, Asian Americans,
Hispanic Americans, Jewish Americans, Polish Americans, Italian Americans,
Greek Americans, Irish Americans, ALL Americans who've made a contribution to
this nation. Not to be identified by ethnicity, these Americans should be noted for
their achievements and recognized as Americans with their ethnic origins only
mentioned as part of their biography.

Only then will American History tell the complete story of this great nation and the
people who made it so. When every American knows the name of the African-American who was the first American killed in the American Revolution, then African-American History will just be American History. ©gjc, 2/20/2011, http//: www.gjchitchat.blogspot.com. All rights reserved.

Don't Underestimate Palin's Power of Persuasion

2011-01-16T23:37:00.000-08:00

My fear is not Sarah Palin, but voter apathy. While we mock and disregard this woman whose very political existence threatens and lessens our democracy, the failure of voters to exercise that right could land this demagogue into a position of power so great we'll all be victims of her wrath for ever having criticized her.

It's going to take more than bad press, low approval rates, and her sheer stupidity to keep Governor Palin from becoming President Palin. While the idea sounds ludicrous, remember George Bush lost the popular vote. It's not Palin's popularity we need to worry about; it's her machinations that have served her well thus far despite all of her many shortcomings.

In the abscense of voter excitement, Palin's vitriol could excite and inflame a public that thrives on revved up, in your face rhetoric. Jared Loughner may not have been influenced by her graphics singling out Representstive Giffords as a political target, but millions of Americans are capable of being rallied by this type of violent imagery during an election campaign.

The same mentality that brings crowds to demolition derbies and wrestling matches could bring them to the polls to vote for Palin while those who don't take
her seriously might very well stay away if Obama's tarnished charisma wears off
by 2012, or can't be duplicated in 2016.

Anyone who doesn't view Palin as a real threat politically probably Aldo believes the anti-christ has to be a man.

Obama's thunder stolen - again!

2010-07-24T06:37:00.000-07:00

It happened at the Democratic Convention in 2008, first when then candidate Obama's moment of manufactured interaction with a real American family was upstaged on stage by his youngest daughter as a live broacast of the encounter was shown to conventioneers while the rest of the Obama family stood onstage next to the big screen, following Michelle Obama's speech. Barack Obama watched the speech in the home of the typical family and his daughters hadn't seen him until he appeared on the video. His prepared spontaneity was completely spoiled by a small child whose excited outbursts upon seeing her absent father kept interrupting his attempt to appear warm and caring.

Well, it happened again. Only this time, instead of everyone's attention being focused on an adorable little girl, the country and the media focused on an amazing woman whose rushed firing by the Obama administration overshadowed the passage of a financial reform bill and Senate approval of Obama's second pick for the Supreme Court, as well as Congress finally extending unemployment benefits.

Given Shirley Sherrod's courageous overcoming of her own father's murder by a white man who was likely a member of the Klan to help save the farm of a white man acting superior while asking for her help, she should be offered more than just reinstatement in the USDA. She should be offered a position in the Obama administration as Minister of Racial Reconciliation. Her story is so human and so like that of many caught up in the hurtful memories and complexities of race relations in this country, she's a natural ambassador for the cause of actually moving past the pain toward healing.

I'm sure she will find a means of spreading her message of forgiveness and I'm equally sure it won't be as a representative of the Obama administration. Why not? She stole his thunder during a week when he made major accomplishments that became "in other news" afterthoughts in the wake of the recrimination against Sherrod, hastily followed by her firing and just as hastily followed by revelation that this woman deserves our respect, not our contempt. Despite Sherrod being told that her firing was ordered from the White House, the President absolved himself
from all responsibility and blamed the director of the USDA for acting hastily.

I believe the order to fire Sherrod came from a White House in panic mode ready to destroy an African-American woman's reputation and life without any further investigation or thought. I also believe the response would have been different had Sherrod been white. Although the anniversary of the President's calling the action of police arresting an African-American professor stupid was also this week, the Sherrod matter was one this administration wanted dispensed of ASAP. It was a
gnat that needed to be swatted out of the way, but that gnat turned out to be a wasp whose sting was sharper than anyone could have anticipated.

Cashing in Obama: A Dream Come True for the Colorstruck

2010-07-05T05:08:00.000-07:00

Have you noticed the Obama lookalikes popping up on television lately? And I don’t mean on “Saturday Night Live.”

Among those cashing in on the Obama mystique are advertisers and producers. Examples of ads with Obama lookalikes are a couple of ads for insurance in which an agent comforts a blonde woman who’s just been in a car accident and a postal employee answers a question about shipping packages internationally, both of whom have ears like the President. Plus a new character on cable’s biggest hit, “Burn Notice,” is a younger, hipper, more coordinated, James Bond-like version of Obama.

Pre-Obama, the most famous black men tended to be dark. The bar was set by the fame of black performers Nat King Cole and Sidney Poitier who, for years, were the only major men of color players on television and film, respectively. Their popularity made the success of darker skinned performers like James Earl Jones, Bill Cosby, Richard Roundtree, Denzel Washington, Wesley Snipes, Eddie Murphy, Taye Diggs, and a host of others possible. Both movie and television audiences were used to seeing black men performing on both the big and small screens, as well as live on stage singing and dancing in large musical venues, in small clubs, and off and on Broadway.

The colorstruck in the African-American community should be happy. This is what they wanted all along. The earliest movies made by and for African-Americans were almost mirror images of white films that cast dark skinned blacks in stereotypical roles: Hattie McDaniel’s Oscar-winning role in Gone With the Wind and a host of roles by Stepinfetchit and Bill “Bojangles” Robinson. Only instead of whites, in films by Oscar Micheaux, the most famous of black filmmakers in the 1920s-1940s, light-skinned, high yellow, or “redbone” African-Americans played the roles normally played by whites.

A common theme was light-skinned African-American men, who were the only ones sought out by women in those movies, being supported and adored by large, dark-skinned women who’d work hard usually as maids. These women would give all their money and love to these “hunks” that eventually left them for a thin, light-skinned African-American women, but only after telling the dark-skinned, hefty women how ignorant, low-class, disgusting, and ugly they were.

Yellow Man, a play written by an African-American woman gives a modern take on this old theme. But in Yellow Man, the light-skinned African-American man who has everything that should make him successful is a miserable failure; while the dark-skinned, fat girl he grew up with and fell in love with but could never marry, is the one who ends up having a successful life. I played the female role in the two-skinned play, actually using make up to darken my face slightly since I’m almost, not quite in the light-skinned category.

Light-skin has been so valued in the African-American community, especially in women, that some strange traditions have been created. In New Orleans, people have to pass the paper bag test to be accepted in certain groups. Held next to a paper bag, the individual’s skin color has to be the same shade or lighter. Families of light-skinned African-Americans stay that way by not marrying dark-skinned people. This is a long tradition in many African-American families, common among doctors, lawyers, and other professionals.

An example is a family in my home city. The father is a doctor and his wife works in the justice system. One of their children is mayor of the state capitol and is also married to a light-skinned African-American. I knew the family of another doctor like that in Lawton, Oklahoma, where I got my undergraduate degree at Cameron University. There are numerous examples in Historic Black Colleges, including the one I attended in Texas. You always knew who the doctors and lawyers children were there.

A frivolous tradition at the school was to pictorially display the “Ten Most Beautiful Girls on Campus” in the annual yearbook. My freshman year, I was appalled to see that all ten were light-skinned, except one, who was Hispanic and not the darker, brown-skinned Hispanic either. When I became editor-in-chief of the college paper the next year, I also became president of the press club and the automatic selector of the ten girls to be pictured as the campus’ most beautiful my sophomore year.

I relished the task and immediately set about finding girls of every hue and hair texture to grace that page in the annual publication. Oh, speaking of hair texture, that’s part of the requirement, as well. Light-skinned with “good hair,” meaning hair that is naturally curly, wavy, or straight – not nappy. The photo that I created for the yearbook that year had the entire range of “blackness.” I did get a copy of the yearbook, but let another fellow PV student from Oklahoma, where I went to live with my parents “borrow” it and it was never returned.

The love of light-skin and “good hair” has resulted in some tragic situations. I have a dark-skinned, large friend who would have done anything to get her light-skinned boyfriend with naturally wavy hair to marry her. Despite being over forty, she decided to get pregnant, thinking erroneously that being a Christian, he’d do the “right thing” and marry her. He didn’t and she had two strokes during labor. She’s presently resides in a nursing home due to paralysis of her legs and her “baby daddy” is married to a light-skinned woman and has custody of their beautiful little boy who is developmentally delayed.

Father and son came to visit me out of the clear blue one day and I just happened to be waiting for a food delivery (otherwise, I’d never have answered the door) and the little boy, who was five at the time, immediately fell in love with me and I with him. I got a feeling that his father thought that since I work in the field I might be more capable of being a mother to his child than the woman he married. However, there’s a code among some women about dating their friends’ exes. I couldn’t conceive of being anything more to father and son than a good friend.

Besides, I’m not attracted to light-skinned men, no matter how wavy, curly, or straight their hair – actually, I prefer men with no hair (or if they must have hair, I find dredlocks quite attractive). I think dark-skinned men are drop dead gorgeous. Oddly, I’ve only had one semi-serious with a dark-skinned man and it ended with me swearing never to see him again because I detected that he was a possible abuser, the biggest turn-off of all for me. I’ve probably dated more white guys than dark-skinned black guys.

However, skin color is not a determiner of who I date. Neither are things like height, weight, education, or income. I’ve dated men of all races (except Asians because none have ever asked me out), nationalities, skin colors, hair textures, heights, weights (I once dated a 600 lb semi-pro bowler who was the most flexible man I’ve ever known), educational and income levels (high school dropouts to advanced degrees), occupations (from doctors to roofers), and political persuasions – yes, I’ve dated right-wing conservatives.

The last man I fell in love with (the second in my lifetime) is dark and quite small in stature, while the first love of my life is tall and light-skinned. The man of my dreams is another man who’s presently unavailable – not married, just unavailable. He’s one of the darkest men I’ve ever known (what’s called “blue black”) and he’s perfect. He lives in my home state, was the last pastor of the church my great-grandfather founded, and wears a cowboy hat and boots better than any man I know.

There is absolutely no romantic connection between this man and me. We met and talked briefly a couple of times as intellectual equals on opposite sides of the political coin – he’s a conservative. However, his present obligations preclude him from any involvement with someone other than the mother of his two children. Of course, he’s a rascal in central Texas, a preacher with two children out of wedlock – oh, my! But I respect his not marrying a woman and then cheating on her, not to mention the respect I have for him because he’s a responsible father, taking care of his children.

While this cowboy preacher is my version of the ideal man, I don’t limit my choices to replicas of him. I recently told both my sister and my bff, both of whom are divorced and want to get re-married, to stop restricting their choices to African-American men. They’re both Christian women and there is a recent trend in interracial marriages among many Christians, including many conservatives. A white conservative man I worked with whose wife died has dated and intends to marry an African-American woman.

Although he and I are friends, he’s way too conservative to ever accept ANY of my liberal views and has convinced himself (and tried to convince me by locking me in a room with him and a Republican male co-worker for a political ideology intervention) that I am also conservative and just masquerading as a liberal. I admit, I am not always on the liberal side of things, but I’m far more likely to be liberal than conservative on most issues. This brings me back to the most popular African-American man on the planet.

I was never a supporter of Obama’s candidacy for President, not because he’s not dark-skinned and my ideal, but because I felt he should have waited until he completed at least one term in the Senate before running for President and, most importantly, because I supported Hillary Clinton. However, the support of the first black President of this nation was unbelievable and, therefore, I am not surprised that the marketability of the Obama image is occurring.

I just hope that Michelle Obama will make darker skinned African-American women just as acceptable and marketable.

Whose Ass Does Obama Really Want to Kick? Rhymes With Stress

2010-06-08T16:47:00.000-07:00

The President's testy response to Today Show host Matt Lowry's suggestion that he start "kicking some butt" seemed aimed more at the press, who he referred to as "talking heads," than at BP. Maybe he's right to be miffed. Many of the pundits that cheered him on during the campaign seem to be turning on him.

A prime example is Chris Matthews. The highly paid MSNBC political talk show host who said candidate Obama made him have a tingling feeling down his leg, said that President Obama's use of the word "ass" was "unpresidential." Other lesser knowns who once rallied behind Obama now critcize his leadership or, in their words, lack thereof in dealing with the Gulf Coast oil spill.

Even when he met their demands to show more passion when he Lowry's impertinent question, they criticzed his choice of words, not because, I believe, he went all 'homeboy' and started talking about kicking some ass; but because these turncoats know the only asses he wants to kick are theirs.

Won't You Come Home, Bill Clinton, Won't You Come Home

2010-06-08T05:09:00.000-07:00

First, let me make it clear. I'm not a fan of Bill Clinton and never was. I have a personal, visceral, negative reaction to men who cheat on their wives which culminated in my writing a play about a female serial killer whose targets are adulterous black Baptist ministers (symbolically, my father).

However, I voted for Clinton twice because I thought he was qualified for the job of President. Given the criticisms of the present President's seeming lack of passion about the Gulf Coast oil spill (the kick ass comment notwithstanding) and failure to show compassion for its victims, one can't help draw comparisons between President Obama and President Clinton when it comes to handling a crisis. While not as inept as President Bush was in his handling of the Katrina crisis, President Obama sure could use some of that Clinton Charm right now.

I say the administration make the former president its emissary in the Gulf Coast region and watch Bill work his magic. He's a loyal Democrat, so I'm sure President Clinton would be glad to help. And while they're at it, why not get President Carter involved, as well, along with both Presidents Bush to show some of that bi-partisanship we'd all like too see in Washington. Well, if we can't get it there, why not in the Gulf Coast?

Whoever else is involved, Clinton should be the point man. No one does better in front of a camera than President Clinton convincing people that he feels their pain and will do whatever it takes to ease it. Slick, Willie.

gjc - Frog Town Diva: CASTING STONES - WORKING OUT FATHER ISSUES

2010-06-08T03:21:00.000-07:00

gjc - Frog Town Diva: CASTING STONES - WORKING OUT FATHER ISSUES

Helen Thomas, Dead Woman Talking

2010-06-07T15:13:00.000-07:00

Always erascible and ever irreverent, 89 year old journalist, Helen Thomas ends a stellar career in disgrace and infamy. Her crime has been judged by a jury of her peers and her sentence is death. No one will give her a lethal injection or place her in a gas chamber to breathe in noxious fumes. Her death will come more slowly and painfully than either of these methods.

She won't die from the shame of having her good name besmirched or being villified in the press. Her death will be by her own hand. She will be felled by that most evil of all executioners: retirement. Without looking at statistics, I know that many people die shortly after or before retirement.

The prospect of day after day of inactivity is fatal for many, usually men. Women seem to have other things to because most women, even those with careers, always had a second job as homemaker. It's that duty they can still look forward to after retirement. While men most likely centered their lives around work and when they no longer work, have nothing to do.

Thomas lived her life like a man in that regard. She did one thing. Work. And now that her job is no longer tenable due to a few thoughtless words, she probably won't live too long after she reaches her ninetieth birthday in August - if she makes it until then. The irony is that once she's dead all will be forgotten and forgiven and her illustrous career will be celebrated in her absence by the very peers who past judgement on this dean of journalism who walked away from her profession wearing the scarlet A of anti-semitism.

I wonder will they leave an empty chair in the front row of the White House press room in her honor?

TRIBUTE TO MLK: A PLAY ABOUT HIS LAST DAYS

2010-01-19T10:00:00.000-08:00

MOSES AT GETHSEMANE
A One-Act Play
By G. Joyce Chatman

CHARACTERS IN ORDER OF APPEARANCE

Quartet – two men and two women of African-American descent, in their mid-to-late 30s
who portray various roles throughout play

MARTIN – Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., African-American male in his late 30s

SETTING

Memphis, Tennessee, in late March, early April of 1968

SCENES

Scene 1: Beale Street, the afternoon of March 28, 1968 after a march led by Dr. King that ended in a riot

Scene 2: The home of Ralph and Juanita Abernathy where Martin and Coretta King have joined them for a fried fish dinner the same night.

Scene 3: Dr. King’s room at the Lorraine Hotel the evening of April 3, 1968

Scene 4: Dr. King’s room at the Lorraine Hotel the next afternoon

SCENE 1:
[Open on “march” as Quartet members break into chatter.]
- Dr. King! They’re breaking windows
- The police are arresting looters!
- A bunch of young thugs!
- Somebody paid them to do it!
- Should we keep marching?
- Dr. King! What should we do?
[Quartet exits and MARTIN moves forward.]
MARTIN
Infamous this day in Memphis, city of my demise. Not since I sat in the belly of the whale that was the Birmingham jail have I know such despair. Beale Street’s blue today, corrupted by youthful greed and impoverished need. But I can’t sing the blues! I only know the words of hymns and the melodies of spirituals. This street that shared its secrets with Elvis gives me no victory, no joy, no success today. Perhaps, like him, I should have skulked through the night to come and take from you all I need and not pay the Beale, but get paid like those who loot and destroy you, oh, great bastion of the blues. (sings) “Jesus, please forgive me. This is not the fight I seek. Jesus, please forgive me. This is not the fight I seek. I’ve done all you said. Held my peace and turned the other cheek.” Take me away from here where shattered glass cracks my voice crying out for justice, but not my resolve, not my spine. I stand determined and unafraid of violence and will not foster it. Bayard, you taught me well Ghandi’s way of waging peace! The great Mahatma taught me that non-violence is the only form of peaceful resistance, but Bayard Rustin unarmed my guards. Never can I raise a hand or a fist in anger in this fight. Never can I wield a weapon or strike a blow. Never can I lead a march that becomes a riot. God, deliver me from this tempest in Memphis! This is not my march. This is not my day. Memphis, you will not steal my dream like Elvis stealing notes from Beale Street to write his own ticket and become the King of Rock & Roll. Here in his kingdom, he rules. And I cannot dethrone him in the name of justice. Were there truly grace in this land – this home of a king, but not this one so named – there would be justice. And I would not be here to endure the injustice of having my methods mocked, my nonviolent protest disrupted by violence – outrageous but not outraged. No, this violence, calculated down to the dollar, knows no anger; only avarice. And I am outraged by its lack of rage. There is no real violence here, just mindlessness. A mob of mercenaries follows me, but I will not lead them that lead me to my own destruction by their wanton willingness to compromise our cause for a few dollar bills. Beale Street has forced me to sing the blues and leave a march defeated. Not beaten, not bowed, but far from victorious. I leave today to return, armed with righteousness and real wrath that needs no violent expression. I go with God from this place of disgrace, from the land of the free fall into the depth of despair to the home of the Braves. Atlanta, I return to your welcome arms! Your sanctuary will be my respite. Your love will be my solace, my peace; be still on this Beale Street so blue – my Waterloo? No, I am no tyrant bringing down destruction, conquering through war. I am but a servant of the Prince of peace, engaging in nonviolent civil disobedience; walking in the very footsteps of my Savior. I walked in those footsteps to Selma and to Washington and they will lead me back here to Memphis.

SCENE 2:
[Quartet enters and starts talking]
- Your husband didn’t say much during dinner.
- He’s just tired. Maybe he’s feeling better since he ate.
- He sure ate a lot!
- Well, he said he wanted some fish. Come calling me talking ‘bout, “Juan, why don’t me and Ralph just buy some fish and you and Corie can cook it for us instead of us going out to eat tonight?” Funny how men are always finding things for us women to do!
- Isn’t it?
- That’s a wife’s duty – to serve her husband. Says so in the Bible.
- Here you go again, talking about Paul. Did Paul have a wife?
- No, but what difference does that make?
- A lot! How can some man who’s never been married make the rules about marriage?
MARTIN
[Has been standing in the center of the Quartet, but moves away for monologue and Quartet exits once he starts speaking]
I hear them talking, laughing, their chatter clutters my ears, making them itch. I know they’re talking, but I don’t know what they’re talking about; because no one is talking about what happened today. They avoid talking about it because they don’t want to upset me. But they upset me more by not talking about it- pretending none of it happened. But it did happen and there is no amount of small talk, joviality, or fried fish that can erase that fact. This day was not my dawn of triumph, neither was it my twilight of defeat. This day remained neutral in the struggle, not taking sides. These twenty-four hours are not my enemy any more than are the misguided youth who tried to shatter a dream on Beale Street and were only able to shatter glass. I do not regret this day nor can I revere it. I just remember it as a lesson in tactics and tenacity. Yet, despite this degree in strategy so recently earned, I will have no victory march in this city without great sacrifice. What more can you take? You already ravished Beale Street, leaving it a relic while your King grew rich from the music he pirated there. Perhaps it is fitting that Beale Street finally exploded in fury today after years of singing the blues for the profit of others. I don’t condone the violence, but I understand it. As a race, we have forgiven so much. But the burden of that forgiveness is a heavy one straddling our backs and pushing us down. I’m not complaining, Lord. I know you brought us here in the hold of slaveships because you had a purpose for us being here. Considering that the people who enslaved us called themselves your servants, maybe you brought us here to show them who you really are. We sure found out in those cotton fields and on those auction blocks. Yes, we discovered the Lord of Moses and created America’s first original art form to express our spirituality. Pharoah let us go, but we are still trying to get to the Promised Land. I know we’ll get there some day. My faith in the Lord tells me we’ll get there and it won’t be much longer. It’s just years, months, weeks, days away. And this day – this day in Memphis will not stop us from getting to the land of milk and honey; the promise of the American dream, my dream.

SCENE 3:
[One member of Quartet enters; he speaks, then exits]
-Dr. King, you sure you don’t want to go to the church with us?
MARTIN
Ya’ll go on. I need some time. [hums “In the Garden” as he prepares to pray]
Moses couldn’t come to the garden because his death had no agony. It was a peaceful passing. Were mine to be, I would not know Gethsemane. But its trees call me to pray under their branches, sit in their shade amid the cool breezes rustling through their leaves. There to make a solitary pilgrimage to my God’s throne. [he kneels to pray] Moses, I join you on Ararat. Now, I know your exultation and your terror. God, how cruel to bring us to the top but not the other side. Only such a God would let your humble servant see the fruit of all his labor, knowing he will never taste it. I thank you for this view [stands] standing on the mountaintop. I can see the future of my people, much like Moses seeing Israel with its own state. I see my people in places of power, ruling this land; making laws and enforcing them; building banks and running them; teaching in ivy league schools; managing Fortune 500 companies; owning, managing, and coaching major sports franchises; dominating the armed forces as generals and admirals; filling the House and the Senate and even the White House – my people in high places- higher than any mountain ever scaled by man. Lord, let me rest on the mountaintop for all eternity, like Moses, watching my dream unfold into full-fledged reality. It was not one man’s dream, but the dream of all humankind. You gave me the vision, now they will have the reality – those future generations who come after me and live the dream. Mountain, I must leave you and your forward vision. I return to Gethsemane to pray [kneels] and I will leave there in peace – ready to face the fate that awaits me. [Quartet re-enters and walks over to MARTIN]
- Dr. King! They’re asking for you at the church. They want you to speak! Come on, I’ll take you! [Two of them rush out]

SCENE 4:
MARTIN
[Pacing back and forth when Quartet comes in]
Where have you been all day, Andrew?
- You know I was in court all day.
You’re supposed to be where I can reach you! [laughs and picks up pillow and hits him with it]
- Hey, don’t hit me with that pillow! [others stop singing and grab pillows and hit him] Ya’ll stop! [one member of the quartet turns to MARTIN]
- Dr. King, we’ve got to get ready to go.
All right, go on outside so I can get dressed. [Quartet exits] Lord, I feel like getting dressed for battle! I know we’re just going out for dinner, but I feel good- better than I’ve felt in a month. I feel so good, I hate to see the sun go down. I want that sun to keep shining and the moon to just keep still tonight. This should be a night without darkness – one that shines for all eternity. God bless this day as it turns toward twilight and let it end in peace. I know this day is a special day and will be remembered as will this great city for its part in today’s history. It was one single day that brought infamy to Memphis, so let this day bring it glory. Let this day be a day of rejoicing and recompense forevermore. No more weeping and wailing in Memphis! Oh, they’re still singing the blues on Beale Street and its distortion in Graceland, but tonight we’ll be singing hymns of joy in this beautiful city where poor people stand united. Memphis, the bell of the South, God gave you this day to make history. Historical times are not new to you. You’ve had your place in the history books, but you are about to write a new chapter in those same books whose pages are smeared with the blood of those whose history they record. Let this latest chapter be bloodless, oh great city. And if blood must be spilled to provide ink to write your story, let it only be a drop. Lord, I feel like marching to Zion! [exits, then, suddenly, a gunshot is heard offstage]
-finit-

SMITE RUSH LIMBAUGH!

2010-01-15T15:37:00.000-08:00

Every Rush Limbaugh listener who calls himself or herself a Christian or who knows how to spell the word has an obligation to let this hater know that he has crossed the line and will be smote for his insensitive and uncaring remarks. His telling charitable Americans not to give aid to Haiti because the President might benefit politically just goes too far in the interminal partisan war being waged in this country. Regardless of feelings about President Obama, the spirit of generosity that is an integral part of the American spirit should not be damped down in this political war.

Limbaugh's callousness and lack of sympathy for a country in peril is appalling. President Bush still gets credit for his efforts to stop AIDS in Africa and he should, even from people like me who didn't vote for him. Likewise, I did not vote for President Obama, but I support his efforts to help the Haitian people. How could any human being not want to help this devastated nation? This is a global effort and leaders of every nation that can provide aid are asking their people to support all efforts to help Haiti. President Obama, to his credit, went beyond partisan lines to ask former President Bush to join former President Clinton to lead efforts in this country, making him a class act and making Limbaugh look like the heartless hatemonger he is.

Christians, unite! Smite this man!

Democrats Are Racist? No Kidding!

2010-01-11T06:17:00.000-08:00

A new tell-all behind-the-scenes of the Democratic 2008 primaries has exposed some racially tinged comments made by prominent Democrats - namely Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and former President Bill Clinton - about then Senator Barack Obama. Having not read the book, I don't know who Reid's comments about Obama's un-Negro appearance and speech to. However, Clinton reportedly told deceased Senator Ted Kennedy that a few years ago Obama would have been serving them coffee.

Somewhere somebody got the idea that racism and racist speech is limited to the GOP. Democrats owned slaves too. They also segregated blacks from whites, not just in the South but in the North as well. Even among some of the most liberal Democratst there are probably some remnants of long-held stereotypes about race. I'm sure if the authors of Game Change had dug deeply enough they'd have found similar comments by other political icons including the now deified Ted Kennedy.

Of course the GOP political machine is at work making political hay out of information published just in time to further stall Reid's efforts to get a healthcare bill passed. Out for revenge for what was done to Trent Lott, they'll play this for everything it's worth. Of course our race neutral president will stay out of the fray unless pressed by the media to comment or maybe he'll just have another beer summit. Or maybe he'll get smart and take a tactic similar to the one taken by Toledo's newly elected mayor when the former called the dark-skinned man who was then the city's fire chief King Kong. Although he did not publicly repudiate the mayor, the fire chief retired and took a job as Ohio's Fire Marshall for two years before running for and winning the office if mayor as an independent.

Maybe the lesson to be learned from all this is that neither political party is free of racism in one form or another, although the Democrats' record on supporting and passing Civil Rights legislation makes any comparison to Lott's wish for no change in the status of blacks in America to Reid's preference for blacks who he thinks look and sound white ludicrous. Political correctness has disallowed people their personal and private biases which are no one's business unless they are used to influence or make public policy. I think both Reid's and Clinton's records show this not the case whereas not many Republicans have voting and legislative records that show support for civil rights.

The mistake blacks make is thinking people have to like us to do what's right. Had we not thought this, the majority of us would not have turned against Bill and Hillary Clinton during the primaries because they expressed biases they've probably always had but that never stopped them from supporting Civil Rights and racial justice in tangible ways. If we jump everytime the media exposes some politician's private prejudices, they'll have us hopping like frogs. Better to accept the possibility that people who don't know you may have pre-conceived notions about us usually perpetrated by the media. No, white politicians are NOT our friends whether they're Democrsts or Republicans. Get over it! They're our Congressional Representatives, our Senators, our Mayors, our Governors, and our public servants - emphasis on public.

Post-Obama Apocalypse

2009-06-15T07:25:00.000-07:00

My grandfather died today. He didn’t live to see the end of the play. I’d hoped it would all end in time for him to know that he and all the others who brought this about had been forgiven, their sins expunged, their penitence served. I know I should burn his collection of Obama memorabilia, but it’s all I have left of him. He could never bring himself to get rid of it, even when it was banned and anyone found with possessing such materials could be arrested and imprisoned. Luckily, his cache of buttons, coins, posters, T-shirts, and books were well hidden – not in an attic or basement where they’d be easily found. These things have been buried under a tree for forty years. I dug them up a few days ago at his request. He wanted to tell me the story. I’ve heard it all before, but he wanted me to understand how he and his contemporaries let it happen.

“He was hope,” Grandpa said, looking at a photo of the deposed President on a campaign poster. “He made us proud to be American, to be black, to be men. Every word he said, everything he did was seen as divinely inspired by many of us. We thought God sent him to save our country and our people. Even after all the expansive programs he created started to fail, many of us believed in him. Some still believed in him when he left office in disgrace.” Grandpa paused not wanting to talk about the tawdry scandal that ended the first black presidency and that made Clinton’s dalliance with an intern look tame by comparison. In his former profession as a journalist, Grandpa said he and his colleagues joked that Clinton’s mistake was having sex with a woman. However, in early twenty-first century America where the religious African-American community that voted down same-sex marriages in California, Ohio, and several other states, there was little tolerance for “alternative” lifestyles, regardless of who lived them. Skipping the scandal, Grandpa talked about what happened just before and right after Obama left office.

“We accepted martial law as necessary because of the crime that ensued when police officers were laid off as city after city was decimated by debt and the failed economy, particularly in the President's hometown, Chicato. People had stopped fearing terrorist attacks following the annihilation of Pakistan and Afghanistan by Obama-ordered nuclear attacks. Although those attacks pushed Iran and Korea to arm themselves with nukes and inflamed other Muslim nations, as well as China and Russia, Al Qaeda, radical jihadists, and terrorist cells were disabled.” I remembered reading in my history books that Obama was heralded a hero when Ben Laden’s body was found among the radioactive rubble, causing even uncertain European allies to approve of the destruction of the two countries where the terrorists lived and trained for their attacks against the West. “Everyone was prepared for retaliation from Iran, China, Russia, or North Korea, but it didn’t come for decades," Grandpa said, continuing his historical account.

“Instead, due to budget cuts in cities all over the country, America was overrun by criminals who were often jobless, hungry young people who had no hope and robbed people on the street in broad daylight, using clubs, knives, and illegally purchased guns. Gun bans didn’t help and only disarmed law-abiding citizens. We demanded protection as more and more people were gunned down for a few dollars. We didn’t blink when the cameras were installed to monitor every street and alley or when the curfews were imposed. We felt it was necessary. Even when the military was sent into police the streets after being brought home from Iraq and Afghanistan, we thought it was for our protection. When they started searching our homes to see if we had guns, we still felt secure because most law-abiding citizens had turned theirs in as ordered by law. Then the protests started, at first just on the internet. Later, I found out anyone who sent or received any of the anti-Obama emails was put on a list of ‘subversives’ by the FBI.

"My name was on that list because your great aunt sent an email to my dad who sent it to me. But it was my editorial that disagreed with but supported anti-Obama forces’ right to dissent that moved me up to the top rung of the list. I was just defending free speech, but it wasn’t long before people were being arrested for speaking out. My website was one of the first taken down as freedom of the press was completely eroded. Online newspapers and magazines that even questioned the President’s policies disappeared suddenly and those that openly opposed him, not only disappeared but their creators were tracked down and arrested. Yet as soon as one website was destroyed, another one was created and the online protests continued, despite efforts to either control or even destroy the internet. Years after Obama’s exile, it was revealed that he’d ordered the destruction of the medium used to spread his message of hope during his Presidential campaign. Public protests, meanwhile, were outlawed and all unauthorized assemblies were stopped by the military that arrested those who organized these events, spoke at them, attended them, wrote about them, or even observed them.

"People started disappearing and there were rumors that some were imprisoned and tortured and others executed. All were called ‘enemy combatants.’ The Patriot Act, which many had hoped Obama would repeal, was strengthened so that every constitutional right Americans had vehemently fought for, including the right to vote, was revoked.” Grandpa paused, his face contorted in pain as he remembered the nightmare he’d lived and that was now our nation’s history. “America had turned into a fascist government and Obama was its ruler. Just when he sat posed to pass a law that would make him ‘ruler for life,’ after outlawing elections due to ‘potentially unruly mobs’ gathering at polling places, the scandal was leaked by his most loyal press sycophants who didn’t have the restrictions that had been placed on the ‘less friendly’ media. Despite those restrictions and heavy monitoring of the internet, the story got out, although it was never reported on the broadcast news which continued to spew Gibbs’ propaganda, showing Obama with his children and his dog, despite having leaked the story in the first place.

"Once the scandal broke, black people took to the streets in numbers so large, the protests couldn’t be ignored. Even after the water hosing and tazzing started, others joined these anti-Obama protests. Finally, after months of using military tactics to attack his own citizens and creating anti-American sentiment throughout Europe, Obama was forced to step down by his own military leaders. However, once Biden was sworn in to finish out Obama’s term, the military stepped down as the law enforcers in the country. Obama’s final speech to the nation was so bitter and unremorseful, people booed their TVs.” I recalled having to learn that speech in school as an example of the result of the corruption of power. “His wife had already left him and returned to Chicago with his children. She was given a speedy divorce and by the time he boarded that plan with Oprah Winfrey, he was no longer married to Michelle. No one was surprised when he married Winfrey and her billions, safely in a Swiss bank account, or when he used her power and money to take over the African nation that became their home in exile.

"Most Americans weren’t even surprised when the Obamas joined the anti-American nations once called the axis of evil by George Bush, the President before Obama whose approval rating was the second lowest in history when he left office. We were surprised, however, that the fascism Obama put in place continued after he was gone. We supported the clean sweep of the Obama administration and the indictment of those who helped put him in office. Bided selected Hillary Clinton as his Vice, and they started dismantling the military control of federal government and returning control to the three branches of government. Once the Obama political team was imprisoned, Congress went after the journalists that were in the tank for Obama during and after the election, dismantling the news organizations of all three major networks and CNN. Fox had long been demolished by the Obama and administration following a long feud that began when they refused to air his speech to a joint session of Congress in the summer of 2009. The only broadcast news network allowed to continue was CNBC. Americans demanded the heads of those who’d supported Obama: Matthews, Olberman, and Maddow from MSNBC and Martin, Braziel, Borgia, Cooper, and Blitzer from CNN, in much the same way they went after congress members who voted for the Iraq War they supported.” Grandpa’s voice was a little bitter as he paused reflecting the demise of his chosen profession.

“Journalism and journalists were outlawed with the people’s approval because it was believed that we put Obama in office by convincing people that he was the man they believed him to be. They were right, of course. It was the media that overlooked his faults, never reporting his rants against anyone that criticized or opposed him, even though we all knew about them and sometimes even witnessed him. I saw him at the 2008 Democratic Convention making up to his wife onstage after his acceptance speech and wondered about it, then later found out from a fellow journalist that he lit into her earlier because their youngest daughter had talked over his scripted dialog when he was shown watching Michelle’s speech with a family in another location. Of course no one blamed Michelle for supporting her husband. Many even suggested she suffered from battered wife syndrome and women all over the world applauded her when she left him after finding out about his clandestine double life. When she ran as Hillary’s vice, it was a sure thing. No media hype was needed to elect the two spouses of the Presidents who’d put the country through the biggest two scandals since Nixon and Watergate.

"They were sympathetic figures, matching the mood and temperament of the nation and they were a shoe-in for election. Each served her eight years gracefully, repealing any of the laws remaining that took away our rights and restoring our democracy. Clinton commuted the sentences of the imprisoned journalists, the very ones who’d brought her down when she ran against Obama. However, neither President was able to restore America’s faith in the media, and journalists are still regarded with disdain and distrust. Anyone and anything associated with Obama is still loathed in this country. I think the Obama memorabilia is outlawed in deference to former President Michelle Robinson. But I want you to keep this so you can remember that it wasn’t a scam. We really believed in him. I know it was wrong of us not to tell the public the truth about him. We knew about his trysts and the rumors about the men who knew about his secret life from Rev. Wright’s church that turned up dead. We just wanted to keep his image pure. We just wanted to believe.”

I listened to my grandfather, trying to hide my own shame of being related to one of the journalists who helped elect Obama. I didn’t succeed because my grandfather looked at me pleading for understanding and absolution. He didn’t get either from me. How can I forgive him? I’ve been drafted to fight in the war against Obama and his allies, a war being waged on American soil. I will be going to boot camp in less than a week, then on to California to try to keep the enemies form advancing. That state is completely occupied by the enemy. Seismologists say the heavy mortar fire has created conditions for a massive earthquake. Luckily, my relatives in Northern California got out before the attacks from China and North Korea. They say they wanted to put America out of the movie business after that movie about the downfall of Obama was released last year and distributed worldwide, making over a quadrillion dollars. That say it’s just propaganda. Obama should know. It was propaganda that elected him and allowed him to almost become a dictator. Now, he and several Muslim nations, along with Russia are said to be preparing to invade the East Coast, which will divide our troops between the two coasts in defense of our nation.

I will bury my grandfather tomorrow and all of his Obama relics with him. Hopefully, some day someone will find those pieces of history and understand what I cannot.

July 4, 2048

What's Wrong With This Picture?

2009-03-27T14:17:00.000-07:00

Four cops killed by an African-American parolee in a city where cops have killed several African-Americans in the past several years and some people actually believe that evens the score? Obviously, the people who feel this way live by the "eye for the eye" Old Testament laws and not the "turn the other cheek" New Testament fulfillment of those laws. If people in Oakland, California, knew anything about Old Testament law, they might not be so quick to sanction mass murder! I realize the killing of Oscar Grant by a BART cop, the fourth such killing in Oakland I believe enrages African-American citizens, but are there people there really glorifying murdering police officers in retaliation? How can anyone really believe it's o.k. to kill people to avenge the death of someone else? It may have something to do with the U.S. being one of only a couple of Western nations that have a death penalty. Or it may have something to do with something else. I don't understand. However, there are some people who seem to have this all figured out according to their own beliefs. Read the following takes on the cop murders and the people killed by the BART cops from the right and left:

March 25, 2009
"Blacks in Oakland celebrate racially motivated murder of four white police officers."
Council of Conservative Citizens News Team(CofCC.org)

"San Francisco Area Black Newspaper praises killing of four white police officers. Calls the killer one of the 'heroes in the human rights struggle for Black people in America.'
The slaughter took place in the Bay Area, the same vicinity as the 1973-1974 'Zebra Killings.' The Zebra Killers and Nat Turner’s band who killed 60 white people in 1831, are among the most prolific serial killers in US history.
The Zebra Killings were carried out by a Nation of Islam splinter group, known as the 'Black Angels of Death.' They awarded points to members for the number of whites killed. The exact number of victims is unknown, but many police officials have put the number at 72.
From View from the Right.
A friend in law enforcement in the Bay Area wrote me,
There were massive parties all over Oakland celebrating the shooting that night. During the interviews on TV there were 20 or 30 people in the background screaming 'F*** the police!' and 'They got what they deserved!' It was everything the officers could do to restrain themselves.
Bay View, a radical rag which calls itself a 'National Black Newspaper,' celebrates the mass murder as 'what some in the Black community see as a day of heroic resistance against the police,' under the headline, 'Police 2, Oakland residents 4.'
A columnist for the paper, Jean Damu, writes, 'When the full story is finally told and, though not likely freely admitted by many, deep within the spiritual thinking of numerous African Americans, an emotional candle will be lit in memory of Lovelle Mixon.'
How many within the black community resonate to these views? More than complacent whites would like to believe, I suspect.
The behavior of blacks in Oakland mimics that of blacks in St. Louis when a black spree killer murdered two cops, three Kirkwood City council members, and the mayor. The killer’s family members defended him on the news and many local blacks openly celebrated the murders."

"Oscar Grant Killed in Cold Blood by BART Cop"
International Communist League
"OAKLAND, January 12—Seething anger against rampant, and routine, humiliation and terror at the hands of the racist cops was ignited in Oakland, California, over the coldblooded execution of a 22-year-old black man, Oscar Grant, by a Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) cop on January 1. The killing of Grant was a shot literally heard round the world in multiple video clips by other passengers in the station which were streamed online.
'We Are All Oscar Grant,' declared signs and chants at a January 7 protest of more than 700 people—including blacks, Latinos, Asians and whites—outside the Fruitvale BART station where Grant was killed. Pointing to the Zionist military onslaught in the Gaza Strip, other signs called to 'End Government Sponsored Murder in the Ghettos of Oakland and Palestine.' Rage and despair in the face of the tired appeals for 'calm' and deadly illusions in 'police reform' peddled by black elected officials and preachers exploded in the streets of downtown Oakland later that night. The Partisan Defense Committee—a class-struggle, non-sectarian legal and social defense organization associated with the Spartacist League—sent a protest letter demanding that all charges be dropped against the more than 100 protesters who were beaten and arrested by an army of riot-equipped cops.
While his cops fired tear gas and rubber bullets at protesters, black Democratic Party Oakland mayor Ron Dellums promised to bring the Oakland Police Department into the “investigation” of Grant’s murder. That will be a gigantic boost to the cover-up machine that BART has already set in motion. In 2002, three cops from the notorious Oakland police gang, the 'Riders,' which was unleashed as part of the racist 'war on drugs,' were completely exonerated of 60 counts of savage beatings and frame-ups. Meanwhile, the Oakland cops continued to gun down young black and Latino men with impunity. In this case, the BART cop who killed Grant has opted to resign while the Feds and California attorney general Jerry Brown are intervening to try to keep a lid on 'tensions.'
At the Oakland protest, placards from the ANSWER coalition, led by the reformist Party for Socialism and Liberation, called to 'Jail Killer Cops!' In your dreams. The capitalist rulers are hardly going to jail their own police guard dogs. And, even if one cop were charged and imprisoned, it wouldn’t stop police brutality and terror. The cops serve, together with the military and the prisons, as the core of a state whose purpose is the repression of the working class and oppressed by any means necessary. From the December 31 shooting of Robbie Tolan, who had been forced to lie down in the driveway of his family’s Houston-area home, to the killing of Adolph Grimes III, who was shot 14 times—12 times in the back—outside his grandmother’s house in New Orleans on New Year’s Day, racist cop terror runs rampant in capitalist America.
For its part, the International Socialist Organization (ISO) has responded to the spate of cop killings under Dellums’ 'stop crime' reign with the argument that: 'Rather than spending millions hiring more inexperienced cops, what would make a real difference in tackling crime would be to hit it at its roots—poverty—by rebuilding Oakland’s crumbling schools and providing decent-paying jobs that would give Black, Latino and poor Oakland residents a real opportunity' (Socialist Worker, 14 August 2008).
The ISO’s cringing faith in the capitalist rulers to provide money for jobs, education and health care at the expense of their repressive apparatus serves only to mask the true nature of this system. Those whose rule is based on exploitation shell out to those they exploit and oppress only what they can realize back in profit. And the racist rulers of America have no use for a whole generation of black youth who were once kept on the bench as a 'reserve army of labor.' Now what U.S. capitalism offers them is jail, a slow death from disease, malnutrition and drugs, or a fast one, gunned down on the streets by the cops or killed in the prison execution chambers of America.
The situation cries out for revolutionary leadership, to organize the social power of labor and unite behind it all the oppressed in a struggle for state power that gets rid of the whole racist capitalist system and opens the road for genuine freedom for all. This is the class-struggle perspective put forward by the Bay Area Labor Black League for Social Defense, which is fraternally allied with the Spartacist League/U.S."

Both sides are stoking the fires of hate and neither, at least in the above articles is being objective. Both are pushing their own political agenda, otherwise, the article written by the right would have also talked about the number of lynchings of blacks by whites and the article written by the left would have mentioned the killing of whites by blacks. I did find an observation made by an African-American citizen of Oakland that mirrors my own views on this latest American tragedy:

"The shootings [of the four police officers] are a tragedy of epic proportions, and should never have happened. Someone wrote that the system failed him [Mixon} and that city leaders failed him, and I suggest his family failed him. I’m a single father, was raised in Oakland and am currently raising a teenage daughter in Oakland. It’s all about personal choices. When he had the choice to use a gun and go to prison or go home to his family, he chose to use that gun and go to prison. He chose to miss a date with his parole officer, which showed he was not a good candidate for parole. I mean what’s a parolee that’s trying to straighten up his life doing carrying an automatic pistol and then firing it at two officers because they pulled him over? And then he runs to his sister’s house and gets an assault rifle and shoots three more cops, wow! He had the opportunity to be educated, but didn’t take advantage of it. (I took my Oakland education and went to law school.) There certainly is a time and place to voice grievances over the behavior of some Oakland police officers, but Lavelle Mixon was no Oscar Grant. As such, he cannot be a martyr for the good black men that are killed wrongly by officers under the color of authority. Oakland has a high crime rate, which Mr. Mixon has contributed to on at least two known occasions. Oakland has a high poverty and a high unemployment rate, but Mr. Mixon didn’t appear to be trying to bring himself and his family out of poverty. In sum, here is a man that shunned educating himself, and instead of trying to get into college, and out of the “hood” decided that being a gangster was more cool, and we all know what happens to gangsters" posted by Cave Man 3/27/09 on NEWS ONE for Black America.

SO WRONG ABOUT WRIGHT

2009-03-24T04:16:00.000-07:00

While in Columbus, Ohio, on business (and to sneak in some "family time" with my mother, two brothers, and sister who live there!), I heard Rev. Jeremiah Wright speak at Ascension UCC, Sunday, March 22, 2009, at 8:30 am.

It was a beautiful, sunny spring day with a crisp morning chill and the promise of warmth later on and I was sharing an experience with my sister, D'Ebrar who has followed in my Baptist father's footsteps and become a minister.

Our father died eight years ago and I recall him saying things as provocative and stinging as the statements made by President Obama's former pastor in those much-played video clips.

Actually, when I was in college serving as editor-in-chief of the newspaper at a state-supported black college that Hugh Downs correctly stated was once called "the Uncle Tom College" when he interviewed its President, I wrote things far more revolutionary than anything said by Rev. Wright or my father in the underground newspaper I published in retaliation for not being able to quote The Last Poets in the school paper.

I wanted to hear and see Rev. Wright in person to affirm what I believed and what the media missed: Jeremiah Wright is no less anti-American than those of us who have believed in and fostered dissent since the birth of this nation.

Was Thomas Payne unpatriotic when he wrote "SOME writers have so confounded society with government, as to leave little or no distinction between them; whereas they are not only different, but have different origins. Society is produced by our wants, and government by our wickedness; the former promotes our happiness POSITIVELY by uniting our affections, the latter NEGATIVELY by restraining our vices. The one encourages intercourse, the other creates distinctions. The first is a patron, the last a punisher"? (Payne, Common Sense, 1776)

While Wright's language was strong and considered excessive by many in those video-clips, it was not as strong as the language used by Frederick Douglass in his Fourth of July Speech.

"This Fourth [of] July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice, I must mourn. To drag a man in fetters into the grand illuminated temple of liberty, and call upon him to join you in joyous anthems, were inhuman mockery and sacrilegious irony. Do you mean, citizens, to mock me, by asking me to speak to-day? If so, there is a parallel to your conduct. And let me warn you that it is dangerous to copy the example of a nation whose crimes, lowering up to heaven, were thrown down by the breath of the Almighty, burying that nation in irrecoverable ruin!"(Douglass, "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?", July 5, 1852).

Now, if that was all of the speech, I doubt that there would be schools named for this great American. However, these words were also spoken that day eleven years before the start of the Civil War: "Pride and patriotism, not less than gratitude, prompt you to celebrate and to hold it in perpetual remembrance. I have said that the Declaration of Independence is the ring-bolt to the chain of your nation's destiny; so, indeed, I regard it. The principles contained in that instrument are saving principles. Stand by those principles, be true to them on all occasions, in all places, against all foes, and at whatever cost" (Douglass).

Fortunately, this historical speech was recorded in its entirety and those passages that some might find offensive weren't be taken out of context. My task when I went to see Jeremiah Wright was to put into context what the media effectively sliced and diced to create the biggest sensation.

What I saw was a classic black preacher at his finest. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. is noted for his oratorical skill as well as his actvism; however, I heard orators as great as Dr. King every time I walked through the doors of a church growing up, especially when I heard my father.

Rev. Wright, who many will always regard as unpatriotic because of one or two statements made to emphasize the "wickedness" of government that used fear to push an agenda that was not necessarily in the best interests of the people, preached a sermon in Columbus. He didn't deliver a revolutionary manifesto or scream hatred from the pulpit as so many believe he does.

His sermon was brief and effective, demonstrating that he is not only a good orator, but a theologian. His text was Isaiah 43:1-5, and he talked about the warnings given by the prophets before the fall of Babylon.

I really believe that regardless of how he may say it, Rev. Wright is only trying to warn us about the dangers of power and corruption - not because he hates his country; but because he loves it.

I am a strong believer in the dissent that I as an American am allowed to express with my government as a constitutional right. Only when such dissent is expressed can we break with policies like the ones put forth by the last administration, which though once popular, were rejected by the majority of American people eventually when it was revealed they were not in the best interest of the people.

Actually, the most unpatriotic statement I've heard anyone make in recent memory was the one made when told that the majority of Americans did not support the war in Iraq, former Vice-President Dick Chaney said, "So?"

AIG, AIG, Bonuses all the Way, Oh What Fun It is to Jump On The Bandwagon Today!

2009-03-17T20:51:00.000-07:00

They're all piling on - Democrats, Republicans, and Independents alike. Everyone is beating up on AIG executives for getting those big bonuses. However, Senator Barack Obama received $101,332 from American International Group in the form of political contributions according to Opensecrets-.-org. The two biggest Congressional recipients of bonuses from the A.I.G. were - Senators Chris Dodd and Senator Barack Obama. So, why is the President and the rest of the pitch-fork-armed mob attacking AIG now? It's not as if they didn't know about the contract guaranteeing bonuses when they handed them billions more in another taxpayer-funded bail-out. The Republicans are not without blame either, since the Bush administration had the same knowledge when they gave AIG the first bail-out, using the same fear tactics they used to start the Iraq War to convince us that our economy would cave in if AIG was not bailed out ASAP. President Obama, who has repeated things his campaign criicized his opponents for saying (Hillary Clinton in the primaries and John McCain in the general election) took his turn playing Chicken Little, too, after criticizing Bush's fear mongering. But to quote the Democrats (and John McCain), fundamentally the economy is sound now that they've been criticized for forecasting too much doom and gloom. I say there's plenty of blame to go around and perhaps all those involved should listen to the wisdom of a simple carpenter who said over two thousand years ago, "He (or she, Speaker Pellosi) who is without blame, cast the first stone." That old adage, "Those who live in glass houses, should not throw stones" may become more than just another cliche as more and more of the hypocrisy of those criticizing AIG is exposed. For instance, our President has asked us not to spend money wastefully, but recently served $100 steaks (imported from Japan) at the White House. We listened for days as the media harped about the Big 3 execs coming to D.C. in thos private jets, but over 300 private jets flew in to the capitol for the inauguration. I fear there are many more examples of extravagance at the highest levels and double-speak (we'll live well while telling all of you peasants to tighten your belts) at the highest levels of our government. So, before we tar and feather AIG's execs, we may want to consider that they aren't the only ones getting "perks" in the midst of this economic crisis.

2009-03-14T04:46:00.001-07:00

A few years ago, I wrote a series on domestic violence in the African-American community. After the second story in the series was published, a young woman came to the newspaper office and asked my editor, who wasn't thrilled about the subject, if she chould talk to me. She told me a story of being stalked and threatened by her ex-husband and that she feared her life was in danger. Althought she worked in the legal profession, she knew there was little that could protect her, including the restraining order she'd take out against her ex. Well, she became the fourth and final installment in my series. However, her husband convinced my editor to publish his side of the story, which seemed to justify his mistreatment of his ex-wife and give a lot of excuses for his behavior. Unfortunately, that's how the series ended and it received almost no response from readers except for the estranged couples who did the unthinkable and aired their dirty laundry in the pages of a newspaper. Domestic violence has always been one of those subjects people don't want to talk about, but that there's plenty of gossip about; for example, it's well known that a local public official beats his wife and the police are frequently called out to his house by the battered woman, yet there has been no 'expose' in our local daily which has the distinction of uncovering the whole Tome Noe scandal. In the African-American, a now deceased Baptist minister regularly beat his wife and everyone knew it. But, although it was talked about in hushed tones during during church services and gossiped about in beauty shops, nothing was ever done to help the minister's poor wife. Many people believe women who remain in relationships where they're abused "must like it." However, it's very complicated for women who are often dependent on a husband or partner for economic support, especially when they have children. I used to have an office at the local YWCA where there is a battered women's shelter. Women who come to shelters like the one at the Y have to summon up all of their courage to do so. I once witnessed a woman being dragged across a street from my office window and later found out they were both police officers and she'd come to the shelter to get away from her abusive husband. When he found out where she was, he came to get her. This African-American couple is so typical of those who live (and sometimes die, either the husband killing the wife eventually or the wife killing the husband in self-defense) with this horrible secret. I've heard that police officers are often guilty of domestic violence, which may explain the cover up that's going on in my city that prevents anyone form doing anything about the public official who regularly beats his wife. He's not the only one: his predecessor once beat his ex-wife when she came to his office when he headed a local agency and she had to be carried out on a stretcher; the employees at the office were told not to talk about the incident. Why do men beat women and why do women continue to remain in relationships where they are battered? And why do women like Rihanna go back to a man who's abused them? Is there a culture of violence that breeds this kind of abuse and the acceptance of it? In the case of Chris Brown, I believe that he is not only a product of having seen his own mother suffer abuse from a batterer, but also of the hiphop culture that objectifies women and supports the "gangsta" image of young African-American men. I'd hoped that having a black President with a self-assured wife would have a positive effect on African-American couples. But that's like saying "The Cosby Show" should have resulted in more African-Americans getting married and staying married and having happy families. One's peer culture has a much stronger influence on one than does any iconic image, no matter how positive. Now that a celebrity couple are embroiled in domestic violence, perhaps more attention will be paid to this issue and more will be done about trying to find solutions to a problem that often results in the deaths of one or more of the people affected. I sure hope so.

BLACK MEN RISING OR REGRESSING?

2009-03-03T04:39:00.000-08:00

Pity the poor GOP. Left with no leadership, they put an Uncle Tom at the head of the RNC and radio bully Rush Limbaugh becomes their rock star, filling in the vacuum of leadership. Glad I’m not a Republican right now!

I’m not a Democrat any more either since the party that held its convention the week of the anniversary of women getting the right to vote has failed so miserably when it comes to actually supporting a woman for President or even Vice-President. I’m in that gray area called “Independent,” meaning I’m looking for direction.

I don’t expect to find it from either of the major parties and, although I voted for Green Party candidate, Cynthia McKinney, I’m not sure I’m ready to take on another party affiliation just yet. I do like that Cynthia McKinney, though. She is a true liberal. Too bad she didn’t get ANY press during the election unlike Ralph Nader who siphoned votes off from the Democrats in the two previous “selections.”

We couldn’t have that during the 2008 Presidential Election when the media was in the tank for the Dems and didn’t want anyone keeping their “chosen one” from winning and winning big. Want to know why the banks and Wall Street keep getting bail out after bail out? Watch Professor Griff from Public Enemy being interviewed in an Atlanta bookstore on YouTube.

The interview took place before the election and the rapper talks about who financed Barack Obama’s campaign. I already knew that, but I doubt that most Americans black or white were aware of how much of the Obama campaign’s funding came from the very folks who put us in the economic straits we’re in right now. Why else would Wall Street’s own Tim Geithner be selected as Treasury Secretary? And why else do these banks and AIG keep getting billions of dollars?

It’s not really Barack Obama’s doing. He’s just the front man in the same way that George Bush was the front man for the GOP for eight years. However, we at least knew who was pulling Bush’s strings – the oil companies which were represented by Dick Chaney, formerly of Halliburton (wonder how long it’ll take before he’s back on board raking in some of the millions our government gave Halliburton in those no-bid contracts?); our new President’s ‘handlers’ are keeping a low profile, although I suspect Zbigniew Brzezinski is the Svengali in this case.

This time, at least, the front guy is intelligent and articulate and can actually use something other than “good old boy” charm and charisma to convince us that we’re not being led into the river to drown as we merrily follow the pied piper. President Obama’s speech to Congress is an example of not only his oratorical skills but the kind of intelligence and thoughtfulness he brings to the office of President, which even I have to admit that this is a welcome change from President’s bumbling, fumbling speeches and press conferences.

However, not all the black folks that have “sold out” other blacks have been ignoramuses with their hats in their hands, shuffling their feet and saying “Yessuh.” Many have been well-educated, well-spoken, and well-heeled by their handlers. We had a name for black folks who let white folks pull their strings down south: the one I used for Michael Steele at the beginning of this piece.

Imagine, Stepinfetchit is alive and living large in 2009 and now he wears a suit and tie and has an Ivy League education! I wonder if that watermelon field the mayor in California put in front of the White House with the caption “Guess there won’t be an Easter egg hunt this year” was aimed as a racial jab at the First Family may have been an unintentional warning to African-Americans that things aren’t what they seem. I know that wasn’t the intent of the person who created the screen saver who said he didn’t know eating watermelon is a racial stereotype.

Of course he said he didn’t know it’s a racial stereotype! And people are upset with Attorney General Eric Holder for saying we’re a nation of cowards when it comes to race? What else do you call people who wear hoods and go around terrorizing people, make racial remarks then plead ignorance, or in the case of African-Americans, insist racism is over because there’s a black man in the White house?

In all fairness to President Obama and Michael Steele, there are a lot of black folks doing the bidding of “the master” in the media, in sports, and in the news media. I especially see this in rap music where names words like “Lil” and “Boy” take us back to slavery when male slaves were emasculated by giving them childish names, not allowing them to wear belts because “men wore belts,” and female slaves were made to bend over and shake their naked behinds for the slave masters’ pleasure just like we see the video vixens do in those rap videos, which it turns out are viewed more by young white males (who also by most of the rap music being sold).

I learned this from Coach Alfred Powell when he visited Toledo a couple of years ago and shared this information with a group of local youth, warning them not to be manipulated by corporate music moguls into regressing into a slave mentality. Well, I think some older black folks need to take heed to that advice, as well.
What better way to lull us and the so-called “liberal left” into complacency than to put a black man in the White House and give us false sense of racial equality and acceptance that may or may not actually exist in this country yet?

I don’t think we want to see an intelligent black man as a sycophant (unless he’s a Republican like Michael Steele or Clarence Thomas); however, regardless of whether we want to face the facts or not, if black folks of either party are being used to get us to sign on to an agenda that is not in our best interests, they’re no different than George Bush who sold us a war so he could give billions of dollars in defense funds to his handlers.

Is it any different when Barack Obama does the same thing, giving billions to the financial community that backed his campaign? We just have to do as Professor Griff advises in his video and think about what’s being fed to us. I was very impressed by this young man, who like me, voted for Cynthia McKinney, and didn’t buy the party line when the media manipulated most of the country into Obamamania.

Someone actually said to me recently, “If I was drowning and going down in the water, all it would take to bring me up would be hearing Obama’s voice in the distance.” This was a Christian minister saying this and she said it with the same devotion and eyes-glazed-over look she has when she talks about Jesus!

I don’t agree with those, like Limbaugh, who want President Obama to fail because his failure would be devastating for the nation. I just plan to keep my eyes open and not be fooled into thinking that having a black President means there’s someone in the White House who has my best interests at heart. Wake up, America! Stop drinking fluoridated water and drinking diet pop so your mind can function and wake up!

A Researched Response to The New York Post's Controversial Political Cartoon

2009-02-21T22:11:00.000-08:00

New York Post Cartoon Based on Long-Held, Hidden Assumptions Historically Associating African-Americans with Apes That Still Persist As Evidenced By Cartoonist

“A woman was mauled by a chimp in Stamford, Connecticut, and a police officer shot the chimp dead. How do you use that image to comment on the controversial Stimulus Bill passed by Obama? Well, if you’re Sean Delonas of The New York Post simply caption the shooting of the chimp in this way: ‘They’ll have to find someone to write that next stimulus bill’” (huffingtonpost.com).

Some folks didn’t get it when most African-Americans reacted negatively to the nooses hung from a tree in Jenna, Louisiana. Some folks thought Don Imus’ “nappy headed ‘ho” remark was just sexist, not racist. However, many folks are taking exception to Attorney General Eric Holder saying during a recent African-American History celebration, “We are a nation of cowards” when it comes to discussing race. I’d understand the outrage had Holder said “white people are cowards” when it comes to discussing race. However, he didn’t say that. He said we are a nation of cowards. That means all of us: black, white, Hispanic, Asian, Native Americans, and every other shade, color, and hue.

Believe it or not, there are many African-Americans who don’t want to discuss race either – that is until they become the victim of racism: then they become willing participants and often leaders of that discussion. I used to joke that black folks in Toledo hated Floyd Rose (a minister who lived in Toledo for several decades and was a community/social activist) right up to the moment they went to him when they got passed over for a job/promotion, housing, a business loan, or some act of institutionalized racism that infuriated them.

The reaction to Holder’s statement notwithstanding, most people – except for the ones who work at the New York Post – seem to get that the cartoon in The New York Post is racist. Obviously, since President Obama is the author of the current stimulus plan, the cartoon’s caption evokes thoughts of him. Add to that the shooting down of a primate and you might get the idea that the cartoonist seems to be indicating that the police officers have just shot a black man, specifically our newly elected President, America’ first black President in a nation with a regrettable history of Presidential assassination attempts, three of which were successful.

“At its most benign, the cartoon suggests that the stimulus bill was so bad, monkeys may as well have written it. Others believe it compares the President to a rabid chimp. Either way, the incorporation of violence and (on a darker level) race into politics is bound to be controversial. Perhaps that’s what Delonas wanted” (columnist, Sam Stein). Stein could be right given that the cartoonist, frequently accused of bigotry, was nicknamed “the Picasso of prejudice” due to his frequent attacks on gays, associating them with bestiality. However, the cartoon which does seem to be about President Obama implicitly, like those nooses in Jenna imply violence against blacks, has a much deeper significance in that discussion about race that Attorney General Holder says we – all of us – as a nation are too cowardly to address.

“The furor might have drawn little more than a public yawn and shrug except for two small points. One is the long, sordid and savage history of racist stereotyping of African-Americans. A few grotesque book titles from a century ago, such as The Negro Is a Beast; The Negro, a Menace to American Civilization; and The Clansman depicted blacks as apes, monkeys, bestial, and animal-like. The image stuck in books, magazines, journals, and deeply colored the thinking of many Americans of that day” (Earl Ofari Hutchison, “Mr. Murdock is Obama Really a Chimp?” Friendly Five, the Dailly News Opinion Blog, 2/18/09). While the excerpt does not state Hutchison’s second point, I imagine it is given that U.S. Presidents have been previously assassinated, the cartoon’s could provoke an attempt on our current President’s life.

Regardless of what the second point may be, as stated by Hutchison, there is a historical precedence that accounts for the virulent reaction among most African-Americans to Delonas political cartoon that dates back to the earliest contacts Europeans had with Africans. “The representation of blacks as apes has been on the cultural conscience of westerners since shortly after the first contact of Europeans with West Africa. ‘Early European maritime writings described primitive people who seemed more closely related to apes than white explorers’” (ScienceDave, “Discrimination Against Blacks Linked to Dehumanization,” NowPublic, 2/11/08).

Unfortunately, history that is not examined and discussed, often repeats itself as demonstrated by ScienceDave’s article focusing on the findings of six studies published by Stanford, Penn State, and UC Berkeley psychologists. “Their work aimed to answer, ‘Is it possible to hold an implicit association between apes and blacks if one is unaware that such an association ever existed?’ In other words, do people inherently associate ‘apes’ with black people, even if they have had no experience with any such association” (ScienceDave). Why are blacks still being associated with apes in the 21st century?

Another article about the studies written by Tom Jacobs (2008) offers a possible answer. “In a widely heralded speech, presidential candidate Barack Obama asked Americans to begin a more honest discussion about race, anger, and prejudice. Such a conversation is unlikely to get far, however, if someone’s not even aware of their bigoted assumptions. And a just-published series of six studies suggests one racial stereotype – that blacks are somehow apelike – is lodged in the minds of white Americans, just below the level of consciousness” (Jacobs, “Studies Expose ‘Apelike” Stereotype Among Whites,” Miller-McCune, 3/21/08). Are blacks still being associated with apes in 2009, because of deeply rooted, assumptions that prevent “honest discussion about race, anger, and prejudice”?

The studies in question used white university students as subjects and three test groups who were shown a black person’s face, a white face, or no face followed by degraded images of animal faces that gradually became clear. “Interestingly, it took the test subjects fewer frames to recognize the ape after being primed with a black face than no face and more frames when primed with a white face than the control” (ScienceDave). Also, given the word “ape” as a prime, subjects who simultaneously watched videos of police beatings of blacks were more like to claim the beating was justified for blacks than whites.

Publication of the findings of the study concluded that “‘Despite widespread opposition to racism, bias remains with us,’ Eberhardt [an author on the study] said. ‘African-Americans are still dehumanized; we’re still associated with apes in this country. That association can lead people to endorse the beating of black suspects by police officers, and I think it has lots of other consequences that we have yet to uncover’” (ScienceDave).

Historically, these associations have been considered reasonable and scientifically justified. “In the influential and now infamous 1854 book Types of Mankind, Josiah C. Nott and George Robins Gliddon rank Negroes between Greeks and chimpanzees on the evolutionary ladder. ‘I don’t think it’s intentional, but when people learn about human evolution, they walk away with a notion that people of African descent are closer to apes than people of European descent,’ Eberhardt told the Stanford University press office. ‘When people think of a civilized person, a white man comes to mind’” (Jacob).

The persistence of these associations and their historical origins that seem to explain in some fashion the results of the studies is also stated by lead author Phillip Atiba Goff. “‘The notion of blacks as apelike began with the first European contact with Africans,’ Goff said. ‘There were illustrations of apes descending from the trees having intercourse with African females. It was perhaps the most popular pictorial representation of people of African descent in the 17th, 18th, and early 19th centuries’” (Jacobs). An image from Jan Nederveen Pieterse’s book White on Black: Images of Africa and Blacks in Popular Western Culture published in Amsterdam in 1990, shows a graphic representation of prevailing stereotypes in the 17th, 18th, and 19th century. Slaveholders promoted the notion that female slaves from Africa were sexually insatiable, stating as fact that these women engaged in sexual intercourse with apes.

Pieterse exposes the intent behind these images. “White on Black is a compelling visual history of the development of European and American stereotypes of black people over the last two hundred years. Its purpose is to show the pervasiveness of prejudice against blacks throughout the western world as expressed in stock-in-trade racist imagery and caricature. Reproducing a wide range of illustrations—from engravings and lithographs to advertisements, candy wrappings, biscuit tins, dolls, posters, and comic strips the book challenges the hidden assumptions of even those who view themselves as unprejudiced….Looking at conventional portrayals of blacks in the nursery, in sexual arenas, and in commerce and advertising, Pieterse analyzes the conceptual roots of the stereotypes about them. The images that he presents have a direct and dramatic impact, and they raise questions about the expression of power within popular culture and the force of caricature, humor, and parody as instruments of oppression” (Yale University Press, 2008).

The question remains, “how is this being transmitted from generation to generation? ‘It’s a fascinating question,’ Goff said. ‘If you look at depictions of Colin Powell, Condoleezza Rice, and Barack Obama in editorial cartoons, they are frequently simian-looking representations’” (Jacobs). T-shirts with a monkey labeled “Obama in ‘08” were sold in Arkansas, during the election which, along with a sock puppet monkey dressed in a suit and wearing an Obama campaign button, created quite a bit of controversy. The folks who made the puppet were shocked at the negative response, but were quick to apologize and attempt to explain themselves.

“We at TheSockObama Co. are saddened that some individuals have chosen to misinterpret our plush toy. It is not, nor has it ever been our objective to hurt, dismay or anger anyone. We guess there is an element of naviete on our part, in that we don't think in terms of myths, fables, fairy tales and folklore. We simply made a casual and affectionate observation one night, and a charming association between a candidate and a toy we had when we were little” (“Creators of TheSockObama™: Of Course We Aren't Racist!” posted by Jeff Fecke on Shakesville Blog, 6/13/08).

Some people still don’t get it. Obviously, the folks at TheSockObama Co. didn’t bother to do any historical research or they would have run across books like Types of Mankind and White on Black or some of the caricatures of blacks that were popular a less than a century ago and that can still be seen in Asia and Latin America, as well in some places in Europe. (This writer was dismayed to see such a stuffed toy in a window display in Europe’s then largest shopping mall in Paris, France, in 1990).

I think these images and the underlying beliefs they represent persist because Attorney General Holder is right: we are cowards when it comes to discussions about race because those who hold these beliefs (including some blacks who look down on other blacks – the uneducated and/or poor – believing they are superior to those they consider lower classed) don’t want to admit to those outside their circle that they have them and those about whom these beliefs are held often don’t want to be confronted with such assumptions.

If we were to have that discussion about this issue which has had such a significant role in the history of our country out in the open, bringing out all of the ugliness and stupidity that surrounds race on all sides, everyone would know that things like nooses being hung from trees and African-Americans being depicted as monkeys, chimpanzees, or apes are offensive, traumatic, and unacceptable; and they’d also know why.

WHO REALLY SCREWED UP & WHO'S PRAYING FOR A MIRACLE?

2009-02-06T17:45:00.000-08:00

You’ve got to respect a man who admits when he’s made a mistake. Not since Jack Kennedy has an American President admitted to making a mistake until Barack Obama made that admission this week when he said, “I screwed up” in regard to the nomination of former Senator Tom Daschle for Secretary of Health and Human Services. But was it the President’s mistake or the mistake of those in charge of vetting potential cabinet members? This same group of people made this mistake not once, not twice, but three times with cabinet nominees who had serious tax problems, including the now approved Treasury Secretary, Tim Geithner, who’s in charge of the government’s tax-collecting agency, an ironic, if not cynical choice. The President maintains that he does not support one set of rules for the politically elite and another for the average American citizen, but while the two other nominees with tax problems dropped out, Geithner, who was also working on Wall Street when the country went into recession, seems to have dodged the bullet. But back to those responsible for not doing a proper job of vetting these cabinet nominees: didn’t the Democrats raise questions about the Republicans not properly vetting Sarah Palin? Now, what? Will somebody finally realize that the best person to head up Health and Human Services, an obvious choice, is former DNC chair, Dr. Howard Dean? It was Dean who conceived the 50-state strategy and internet blitz that Obama used to win the 2008 election. Sure, Obama refined Dean’s concept and honed it into a well-oiled political machine, but it was Dean’s idea initially. Yet, Dean has been ignored since the election. Word is Dean doesn’t get along with Rahm Emanuel. So? Who cares? They don’t have to be buddies! They don’t have to play golf together, visit each other’s homes, go on golfing dates, or have sleepovers! They need to serve the country and, in my opinion and the opinions of quite a few other folks, Dean has always been the best choice for Secretary of Health and Human Services. Cenk Uygur stated On The Huffington Post “no one can dispute that Howard Dean was right about the 50 state strategy, and this undoubtedly helped Barack Obama and a lot of Democratic congressmen and senators get elected. He's also been exactly right on the policy issues. Shouldn't the Obama administration reward competence?” Posted November 25, 2008 08:15 PM (EST.) “Former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, the man regarded by many sharp political operatives as the progenitor of President-elect Barack Obama's successful 2008 campaign, finds himself without an obvious next job as his tenure at the head of the Democratic National Committee comes to an end….And yet, it's hard not see Dean as a lesson in how political hardball is played in Washington. Never liked by establishment party figures -- Dean publicly feuded with incoming White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel when the latter was at the head of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee during the 2006 election cycle -- Dean finds himself on the outside looking in as a new Democratic Administration comes to town….Dean then made a play to be secretary of Health and Human Services in the Obama Administration but was quickly shot down in favor of former South Dakota Sen. Tom Daschle, a confidante of the president-elect….” The Fix by Chris Cillizza, washingtonpost.com's Politics Blog The Denouement of Howard Dean. The Dean-Emanuel conflict wouldn’t be the only contentious relationship in the cabinet should Dean get the job of Health and Human Services Secretary. However, I think the likelihood of having innovative and feasible ideas for health care would be worth bearing with any squabbles these two may have. However, there is still some resistance to the notion that President Obama "screwed up" by not giving Dean the job in the first place. Evan Thomas from Newsweek said in a recent television interview when asked about the mistakes made in not properly vetting Daschle and other cabinet nominees who turned out to be in arrears with their taxes, “Would Hillary have done any better?” I like to think that having more experience, Senator Clinton would have had the good sense to nominate Dean for Health and Human Services Secretary; but I can’t complain too much because President Obama had the good sense to nominate her! Meanwhile, in other developments, the economic stimulus package seems to have hit a snag after being hijacked in the House by Nancy Pelosi, still tasting victory and flaunting her powers. Nevertheless, the Senate seems poised to approve some version, probably not the best, of the bill that is this nation’s only hope for some economic relief. Do you get the feeling of being on a sinking ship right about now? There is a plane going down on the Potomac. Flocks of birds have taken out both engines - Blue Jays took out the left engine and Redbirds took out the right engine. The pilot who is flying an Airbus 1600 on his first flight out is intent on making it to the nearest airport. Having promised the 303, 824,640 passengers on U.S. Airways Flight 2009, to safely transport them out of a recession, the novice flyer refuses to accept defeat. “We’re having some trouble,” he reports to Air Traffic Control. “Are you going to continue and land at the nearest airport?” an air traffic controller asks. “If we don’t act now, we’re going to go from crisis to castastrophe,” answers the pilot. “But what are you going to do?” asks the controller again. “Look, I found those birds when I showed up. I found them, doubled, and wrapped in a package with a great big bow!” said the pilot. “What?” asked the confused controller. “I guess they were listening to Rush Limbaugh and he told them to take out our engines,” mumbled the pilot. “Flight 2009, can you land at the nearest airport?” The controller’s voice increased in volume as time ran out for the pilot to make a decision. “Yes we can! All we have is hope and the audacity to believe in change, so we’re going for it!” said the pilot as the passengers cheered in the background. The controller was concerned, knowing that the plane was still minutes away from the airport and not sure how long the plane could stay in the air. “Boy, where is Captain Chesley B. "Sully" Sullenberger when we need him?” mumbled the concerned controller, fondly remembering “the miracle on the Hudson” as he prayed for a miracle on the Potomac.

Obama B(l)acklash!

2009-02-02T02:59:00.000-08:00

I wrote the following letter to the news director of Toledo's CBS affiliate, only to find out after a week-long stay in Columbus that Toledo's only African-America evening news anchor, Shenikwa Stratford was replaced by a white female. More Obama B(l)acklash - negative reaction to the election of America's first black President either due to the assumption that having a black President negates the need for affirmative action or post-election resentment rooted in racism. Either way, this is not acceptable and I won't be watching any local television news in Toledo except on weekend evenings.

Mr. Chirdon,

I'm not sure why Rev. Larry Whatley no longer does the traffic reports on Channel 11's morning news, but do you realize that with his absence there are now no African-Americans on local television news in the mornings? While your new female anchor is very professional and a good addition to your news team, there are several African-American reporters (Mikah Highsmith, for example) who could have been placed in that position when Melissa Voestch moved to a later newscast.

Unlike channels 24 and 13, Channel 11 does not seem interested in giving reporters the opportunity to develop their skills by putting them in morning anchor positions. Evening anchor on Channel 24, Shenikwa Stratford, developed her skills as an anchor this way, as did Efrem Graham and Kristen Brown, the weekend morning and evening anchors on Channel 13, respectively. These are all African-American broadcasters who were given the opportunity to advance.

I watch Channel 24 at 6pm and 11pm to see someone who looks like me reading the news; I also watch Channel 13 news Saturday and Sunday mornings and evenings for the same reason. I used to watch Channel 11 news weekday mornings because of Rev. Whatley. Our relationship goes back to 1990, when he worked for Channel 13, and had me on his show to discuss the debut of my theatre company, Toledo BlackStage, and its debut production, my original musical play, "Juneteenth." I am a loyal fan of his and the other reporters previously mentioned.

I am no more hesitant to admit I am happy to see African-Americans on the news than Italian Americans, Greek Americans, Polish Americans, or any other ethnic groups are happy to see people of their ethnic group in the public eye. However, there seems to be this b(l)acklash to having a black President. There have been some positives and they are welcome. But there also seem to be some unwelcome negatives, such as African-Americans suddenly disappearing from public eye, as in the case of Rev. Whatley.

While you have every right to hire the most qualified professional to fill positions on your news team, as a journalist who never got the opportunity to be a reporter until African-American newspapers hired me, I understand the importance of giving people a chance to develop their talents. As a viewer, I'll be frank: I want to see African-Americans in every news cast I watch. I don't watch any of the evening newscasts of any of the three major networks - CBS, ABC, and NBC- because there are no African-American anchors on any of them.

This may not seem important to anyone else, but in 2009, the year America got its first black President, I don't think it's too much to ask that there is at least one African-American anchor on one of the major networks and on one of the three local morning news programs.

My only reason for watching Channel 11 was because Rev. Whatley was part of your team (I also love meteorologist, Mike Stone), but now that he's not there any more, I tend to turn to MSNBC as soon as I watch the weather report. I usually to wait until 6:00 to turn to "Morning Joe," but now I may just watch Headline news at 5:00, and get my local news and weather from The Blade, which does have African-American reporters.

G. J. Chapman
WTOL- viewer since 1988.

Change We Can Believe In or More of The Same?

2009-01-22T10:28:00.000-08:00

Following is a very clever and well-written poem. I contacted the blog link and complimented the poet, adding the hope that he will use his tremendous talent to write something more hopeful and not continue the partisanism that has gotten our nation into the state it's in today. The fact that this is being passed around indicates to me that some of us didn't get President Obama's message January 20, 2009, when he said, "On this day, we come to proclaim an end to the petty grievances and false promises, the recriminations and worn out dogmas, that for far too long have strangled our politics. We remain a young nation, but in the words of Scripture, the time has come to set aside childish things."

It may not be "childish" to 'dis' the opposing party, but it is definitely counter-productive. Obviously, this was not what President Obama had in mind when he sat down with the leading conservative Republicans at George Will's house or when he hosted a bi-partisan party for John McCain or appointed Republicans to his cabinet. He seems to be intent on healing the party rifts that have dominated the last two administrations. However, if the people who elected him and support his administration continue to 'bash' people because of their political affiliations, there won't be any change in the way this country is governed.

I listen to news programs that repeatedly talk about the number of Republicans who are supporting President Obama and are trying to work with him. I'm sure there are some who still aren't, but in respect for those who are, shouldn't Democrats and the Independents who he's asked to help him with the changes he is trying to affect cease and desist with the venom and rancor?

Perhaps I'm too idealistic, but what I saw yesterday on the Washington Mall was not a sea of people, but a sea of hope. Was that hope just for a single day? Now that we have a black President, do we go back to business as usual as if getting a black man elected is the end of the story? President Obama doesn't think so. He made it very clear at the Inauguration Balls he attended last night that this is just the beginning.

So, how do we begin? My hope was that the hope I saw in the eyes of those witnessing the swearing in of a new President yesterday would continue and flourish. My hope was that the American people heard the President's message and are prepared to make the necessary sacrifices to bring prosperity back to our nation. He's not going to wave a magic wand and end all of our troubles; he's going to roll up his sleeves and we need to be prepared to roll up ours. However, the needed sacrifices aren't just in the area of hard work. We also need to sacrifice our old attitudes.

I had to remind my mother who still retains the attitudes expressed in the following poem that Republicans haven't been alone in practicing 'dirty politics.' Look at the smear campaigns during the Democratic primaries, as well as the concerted efforts to destroy Sarah Palin, going as far as attacking her teenage daughter. Not that the Republicans didn't do the same. But the point is when does it stop?

President Obama is asking Americans to work together? Can we? Before you repeat the mantra, "Yes, we can!" be aware that by saying that you are taking an oath as sacred and as solemn as the one the President took yesterday to rise above this kind of partisan bias and make an effort to do what the President proclaimed yesterday. "On this day, we gather because we have chosen hope over fear, unity of purpose over conflict and discord."

The poem below ends with the mantra, "YES, WE CAN!" Can what? Yes, we can do a lot of things, including continuing the bickering on Capitol Hill, the racial prejudice on Main Street, and the financial corruption on Wall Street. We can do all of that and a whole lot more of "the same old" things we've been doing. The issue not what we can do, but what we will do to bring about change.

So, read the poem and laugh if you find it humorous and admire the poetic flair of the poet. Then, if you're a Democrat, find a Republican and do what President and First Lady Obama did to former President and First Lady Laura Bush as they prepared to board a helicopter to make their final departure from the nation's capitol: HUGGED THEM! Let this be the new mantra of those Democrats who pledge to help the President create a "post-partisan" America:

EMBRACE CHANGE - HUG A REPUBLICAN!

Twas the Night Before Inauguration
By John Cobarruvias
BayAreaHouston.blogspot.com
T'was the night before inauguration and what to my dismay
The market was tanking, I lost my 401K!
The stocks were hung, in downfall they stuck
While Bush did nothing, a truly lame duck
The republicans were nestled, their heads in the sand
With visions of defeat of the republican brand.
And Cheney with his gun, his heart a pace
Looking for someone, to shoot in the face.
When out on the house floor, there came such a clatter
I sprang to the internets to find what's the matter.
Away to my screen I ran with a flash
Hoping the market, didn't crash.
The moon on the breast of the new fallen snow
Showed me someone I needed to know.
When what to my eyes, I paused, with a comma
But a vision of hope, It was Barack Obama!
With excitement and conviction in each of his steps
I wondered what he and his elves, would do next.
More rapid than eagles his appointments they came
And he whistled and shouted, and called them by name.
Now Emanuel! Now, Dashle! Now Richardson and Biden!
On, Clinton, On Napolitano, and Gates, no sense in hiding!
To fix the economy, our reputation and more.
And to stop the killing of this unnecessary war.
As Obama stood still, the republicans they trembled
Remembering 8 years of a disaster they had assembled.
They've broken our banks, and doubled our debt.
They scared us to death with weapons of threats.
They squandered a surplus, They started a war.
They shredded our constitution, littered on the floor.
They attack our unions, our immigrants and those who are gay.
They claim to be Christians, yet on the sick they prey.
We may never recover from this hole they dug.
But we will climb to the top with a American tug.
The republican party have destroyed all that matters
They deserve nothing more but to hold the damn ladder.
But his voice did change, along with a smile.
Thinking of the bills that soon would be filed.
Protect those who are old and young alike
Restore our honor and our military might.
Protect our planet, and clean our air.
While creating a surplus we can leave to our heirs
Fix our economy, and health care for all.
And honor those who fought, and those who fall.
Obama sprang to his feet, to his team he gave a shout.
The challenges seem impossible, hard work needed no doubt
But I heard him exclaim ere he talked and ran.
Hey! It's not just a slogan,
YES WE CAN!

OBAMA OFF TO A GOOD START!

2009-01-08T12:59:00.001-08:00

CHIT-CHAT BY GEOYCE CHATMAN
© gjc, 1/08/09

OBAMA HITS THE RIGHT NOTES WITH CABINET PICKS, STIMULUS PACKAGE, AND BURRIS APPOINTMENT

O.K., so he said “no” before he said “yes” ala John Kerry, hitting a decisively sour note; but in the end President-Elect Obama made the right decision about Roland Burris. Regardless of what he may or may not have actually done, Illinois’ governor still has the power (and the right) to appoint someone to take over Obama’s Senate seat.

In a shrewd move, Rod Blagojevich appointed someone capable, qualified, and black to the seat vacated by our President-Elect after his election. Majority Leader Harry Reid looked pretty ineffectual trying to keep out the only African-American in the Senate, then having to capitulate after Burris got the nod from Obama.

Senator Reid may not work for Obama, but he apparently follows his soon-to-be President’s lead, and he should in this case. Same thing with the stimulus package. The President-Elect is right to want the passage of his stimulus package to be swift and big enough to actually make a difference.

Few people want the trillion dollar debt that Obama is predicting that he says we’ll have well into the future; but even fewer want to be unemployed and homeless. The stimulus package is absolutely necessary, just as were the bail-outs, however distasteful and mismanaged they may have been.

Obama’s cabinet picks, although they included only a handful of women and minorities, were wise ones. I totally support the selection of Leon Panetta as head of the CIA. Panetta has a long and distinguished public service career and is not a product of the Bush-Cheney intelligence gathering fiasco that was used to justify the Iraq War.

Going into his Inauguration Week, our future President looks pretty good. He’s made smart, thought-driven decisions on a number of issues and refused to get involved in foreign policy- making before he has the power to follow-through on those decisions. He’ll have plenty of time to deal with the Middle East once he’s sworn in next week, and I’m sure he will use more diplomacy than the present administration; I sure hope he does.

Our President Elect has also shown his ability to inspire Americans and give the nation back its passion for democracy. That’s why I sent my speech on sacrifice to his transition website, hoping he’ll include parts of it in some future speech. (I’ve included it at the end of this column.)

I look forward to watching the inauguration of our first black President and hope that all goes well next Tuesday and throughout Obama’s term, whether it is a four-year or eight-year term. The hope he has inspired in the American people is very much needed right now given the state of our economy and the economic hardships being suffered by so many American people.

God willing, that hope will turn into tangible results and our economy, international reputation, and trust in our leaders will be restored.

Godspeed, President Obama!

Someone Should Make This Speech and Inspire the Nation to Rally to the Cause of Saving Our Economy the Only Way We Can: Through Sacrifice, Patience, and Unity

“America has withstood many attacks in the past, external and internal. We fought two wars on this continent. The first was for our independence and the second war was for our union. Both times, America was victorious. We have survived a Great Depression that swept through our nation and impoverished our coffers, but not our spirits because Americans know how to fight. We fought to bring this nation into existence and to preserve its unity. We have fought to bring our nation back from the brink of economic ruin into an age of prosperity. How did we do it? We did it by making sacrifices. We sacrificed our sons and daughters in wars here and abroad fighting for the only thing worth fighting for – our freedom. We sacrificed our comfort and our physical health to do the back-breaking labor needed to bring us out of one depression. No one has asked us to make any sacrifices for some time now. However, now with our economy in such dire straits, sacrifices will have to be made. Some estimate it may take as many as ten years for us to recoup from the losses on Wall Street. What sacrifices are we willing to make to bring back the prosperity we once enjoyed? Without sacrificing our tax dollars, we will lose even more than has already been lost. Greater minds than mine can detail those losses for you and explain why we need to sacrifice so much of our resources to right this wrong to our capitalistic system. Many of you are angry because when you make bad decisions, no one bails you out and when those of you who own small businesses watch those businesses fail, no one covers those losses. You are right to be angry. Those who caused this crisis are responsible. However, they are responsible for more than just individual failures or the loss of one business. They are responsible for bringing our economy to its knees. Are we willing to make the sacrifice needed to bring it up on its feet again? A great President once said that we should not ask what our country can do for us, but what we can do for America. I’m asking you what are you willing to sacrifice for America? Is America worth a trillion dollars to you? Is our economy worth the sacrifice of your tax dollars to ensure the future of capitalism? Are you willing to pay, not to just bail-out Wall Street and the Big Three Auto Companies, but to re-build Main Street? I ask, you America, is our nation worth the sacrifice? And if your answer is ‘yes,’ will you join me in making that sacrifice and giving whatever resources we need to give and demanding the reforms and regulations necessary to make sure that our economy regains its strength? Join the millions of Americans throughout the history of this nation who’ve marched through the ages, soldiers in the freedom army, fighters for the cause of liberty, warriors for peace and prosperity. Join me, America. Join me in this effort and make whatever sacrifice we have to make for America. She’s worth it!”

Joe of "Morning Joe" Embarassed by "Stunningly Superficial" Views on Foreign Policy

2009-01-02T19:18:00.000-08:00

Bush-apologist Joe Scarborough finally got his come-uppance from foreign policy expert Zbigniew Brzezinski, on his show "Morning Joe," which I confess to watching every day - not because of Joe, but because of the variety and quality of the guests who provide a much more balanced "sound byte" view of current political events the rest of MSNBC's "news" programming. Like Blago, Joe is a poster child for narcissistic personality disorder, taking every disagreement (let alone, criticism!) as a personal attack and denouncing Jimmy Carter while extolling the dubious accomplishments of the most unpopular President in recent history.

I read with glee The Huffington Post. "posters" who skewered "Joe Blowhard" and posited informed and insightful opinions about the situation between Israel and Hamas. I agree with almost all comments made, especially that ZB's comment was that Joe's views are "stunningly superficial," not the host himself; Mika Brzezinski is highly underrated (you should have seen her stand up to Joe and Tucker Carlson when they ganged up on her!), that ZB should be on more 'serious' news shows like "Meet the Press "; and that shows like "'Morning Joe" tend to "oversimplify exceedingly complex issues," as stated by Philosopher.

The problem is that shows that try to deal with the complex issues that constitute politics generally and foreign policy specifically do not get high ratings usually. One of my favorites is PBS' "The Newshour with Jim Lehrer" and the entire PBS Friday lineup that is probably the best "news" on television. But who's watching it beside those of us who want more than quick "sound bytes" that are easily digested?

Also noted by ThePhilosopher, shows like "Morning Joe" often present two opposing sides shouting above each other in so-called discussions about important issues. To use another metaphor, the American public wants their news presented like "Monday Night Football" with two teams with opposite views that they root for based on where they're from (party affiliation) and the color of their uniforms (classification as "liberal" or "conservative").

However, I will still watch "Morning Joe" every day because it wakes me up and I get to hear some of my favorite pundits who include in addition to ZB, #1: Jonathan Capehart; Pat Buchanan(yes, I did say PAT BUCHANAN because he's honest and doesn't usually take himself too seriously, unlike "Joe"); Mike Barnicle; Carlos Watson; Dylan Ratigan; Harold Ford, Jr.; Tina Brown; Eugene Robinson ; Rev. Eugene Rivers; Jessie Jackson, Jr.; and the occasional lucid and engaging politician and/or celebrity.

They all provide a nice counterpoint to Joe's huffing and puffing and spouting conservative rhetoric trying to sound scholarly when he only reads books with one point of view.The show is my wake-up call and a reminder that Friday night is coming and I'll get to watch 'Bill Moyers Journal'!

MY COLUMN IN CELEBRATION OF THE HOLIDAYS

2008-12-28T09:35:00.000-08:00

Chit-Chatting
© gjc, 12/29/08
After Xmas and Hanukkah, During Kwanzaa, and Before New Year’s Eve

After Xmas When I Was Full of Comfort & Joy (and a Cornish Hen)

Although I boycotted CNN for a year after the news channel helped sell the Iraq War to the American people and was in the tank for George Bush in 2004, I recently have become a fan of two of the networks shows: Campbell Brown: No Bias, No Bull and Lou Dobbs Tonight.

Actually, I was a previous fan of “Mr. Independent” until he became obsessed with illegal immigration (guess I was an independent even before I quit the Democratic party after their failure to put a woman on the ticket at this year’s convention).

Now, when Lou starts his “protect our borders” rants, I justvswitch channels. However, I do listen to his unbiased and balanced discussions with various media pundits about the economic crisis and the incoming administration; same thing with Campbell Brown. Her show is the real deal: no bias, no bull.

Along with Morning Joe on MSNBC, these are the only news shows I watch daily. I also watch The Newshour with Jim Lehrer on PBS at least two or three times a week and the network’s Friday night lineup, as well as the Sunday morning news shows on the three major networks (I can’t stand their morning shows with all the “infotainment” drivel that passes for "news" their biased evening “news” broadcasts!)

I’m channeling my father, who was a newshound and could never watch enough news (I don’t share his love for television sportscasts, however). Watching all these news casts inspires me to write my own opinions in this column. My post-Xmas gift to you is these little “stocking stuffers” of tidbits about various news items. I know it’s not much, but…

First Larry Summers, Now Rick Warren – What is Our President-Elect Thinking?

I wasn’t surprised that our President-Elect appointed a misogynist to his cabinet. After all, he did call a woman “Sweetie” during the campaign and remember his remark about Senator’s Hillary Clinton’s experience?

"It wasn't too long ago that Barack Obama and his advisers were tripping over one another to tear down Hillary Rodham Clinton's foreign policy credentials. She was dismissed as a commander in chief wanna-be who did little more than sip tea and make small talk with foreign leaders during her days as first lady. 'What exactly is this foreign policy experience?' Obama said mockingly of the New York senator. 'Was she negotiating treaties? Was she handling crises? The answer is no'" (NANCY BENAC, Associated Press Writer Nancy Benac, Associated Press Writer – Sun Nov 30).

I'm also not surprised that he asked Pastor Rick Warren to participate in his inauguration. He did previously attend Rick Warren’s church, stirring up controversy for Warren among Evangelicals, when he and the mega-church pastor joined forces in the fight against HIV/AIDS. Besides, the President-Elect, who supports gay rights, has made it very clear that he does not support gay marriage. And it is Warren’s support of California’s recently-passed Proposition 8, reversing the state’s Constitutional Amendment legalizing same sex marriages that has the gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender community up in arms.

Does the GLBT electorate have the right to be upset that Warren is giving the invocation at the Inauguration next month, given their overwhelming support of our new President? What if, to foster diversity and inclusion, the President-Elect had asked Thomas Kroenke, the so-called "hastus primus" or spearhead of the World Church of the Creator (a white supremacist church) to give the invocation?

Would his African-American supporters have been offended? Of course they would have! So, we should not begrudge the GBLT community for taking offense to having a man who not only opposes same sex marriages, but compares their lifestyle to bestiality, incest, and pediophilia present at the event. While Warren’s beliefs reflects those of many in our society, including most likely many of the African-Americans and Hispanics who voted for Prop 8 in California, aren’t they biased?

And for those African-Americans who don’t get it, Warren’s statements about the GLBT lifestyle are equivalent to calling black women nappy-headed ho’s (which got Don Imus fired from MSNBC), saying blacks were bred to be strong (the comment that got Jimmy the Greek fired from his job as a commentator on CBS), or stereotypes such as the one that we eat a lot of fried chicken (when Fuzzy Zoeller said this, he lost a lot of money in endorsements).

It’s no longer o.k. to publicly express bias toward blacks (remember all the furor around the nooses hung in the tree on the school campus in Jena, Louisiana, as well as subsequent “nooses” found in various places around the country?), but it’s still perfectly all right to gay-bash using religion as the basis for writing off a whole segment of our citizenry.

Regardless of your religious beliefs, it’s not all right to publicly state that gay people are pedophiles. This is the kind of erroneous thinking that put my brother, James, in jail for 18 months and will put more gay people behind bars if we don’t stop promoting this nonsense! Remember how many black men were falsely accused of raping or intending to rape white women and were lynched in this country? Don’t we learn anything from history?

Personally, I like Rick Warren (he did write "A Purpose Driven Life") and feel that the President-Elect has the right to have anyone he wants involved in his administration and his inauguration. However, Obama was elected by a very diverse group of people and every single one of those groups wants him to remember its part in helping him get into office. I don’t believe African-Americans would stop supporting him if he included a white supremacist in the inaugural celebration and gay people probably won’t withdraw their support because of Rick Warren.

However, please try to understand why they’re upset. Even though African-Americans wouldn’t withdraw their support of Obama, they’d complain loud and long if he included someone in this celebration that many African-Americans will attend who makes them feel uncomfortable. That’s all the GBLT community is saying. They’ll be there in large numbers, too, and having Rick Warren there will make them feel uncomfortable. Get it?

Years ago, televangelist Frederick Kc Price did a 37-week long study of “Race, Racism, & Religion” on his weekly hour-long broadcast. It was comprehensive in researching the ways religion was used a century ago to justify the treatment of blacks in this country at the time. Dr. Price quoted books written by theologians of the time.

Some of the statements made by religious scholars were astounding and, although they seem ludicrous now, they were accepted as fact a hundred years ago. (Similar research has been compiled about how religion is being used against gays presently and I’m sure some day statements made by ministers about gays now will seem just as ludicrous!)

Meanwhile, a liberal minister summed it all up this way, for all who are offended by Rick Warren’s presence: “It’s two minutes. Get over it!” He has a good point. Why let a few moments of unpleasantness ruin the whole party? I’m sure there will be loud protests during Warren’s prayer and some present will view it as sacrilege and blasphemy.

So is comparing sex between two consenting adults to sex with animals, relatives, and children AND the numerous hate crimes against blacks, Jews, Hispanics, and gays that have taken place in this country. So, if you’re at the party and you see GBTL folks “acting up” while Warren is speaking, be tolerant. You’d “act up” too if someone who expressed similar views toward you showed up at the party and spoke, no matter how briefly!

After Hanukkah: My Jewish Bi-Racial Nephew, Who Has Converted to Mormonism, Supported McCain, His Father Supported Obama and The Two of Them Had a Great Time Campaigning and Arguing About Politics Election Day!

Is it me or does our new President seem to like conflict? His national defense team (which I like, of course, since it’s headed by a woman) is in opposition on his views on the war (remember, he kept reminding us that Senator Clinton voted for the war - along with the majority of the Senate and the support of most Americans, I might add). His treasury department (which I don’t like) includes one controversial figure and one of the participants in the economic crisis.

He also has people on opposite sides of the free-trade issue in his trade department and, as previously discussed, Evangelical minister Rick Warren is giving the invocation at his inauguration. Some in the media speculate that Obama is inviting healthy debate and fostering diversity with his choices, while others think he may be crating a contentious climate in the White House at a time when unity is desperately needed in this country.

At the risk of sounding like Nancy Reagan, I was born on the cusp between the zodiac signs Virgo and Libra, but I must be more Libra than Virgo because I crave balance (I really don't believe in astrology, however; I think it's a parlor game and prefer numerology which is odd since I'm mathematically challenged!). Therefore, healthy debate and diversity are my middle name (actually it’s ‘Joyce,’ hence the pen name ‘Geoyce,’ a blending of ‘Geneva’ & ‘Joyce’).

My favorite period of history is the 1960s through the 1970s when diversity was abundant and people were engaged in conflict, not because I like conflict (I hate war with a passion!), but because I think in a democracy, people should be able to disagree and discuss their differences with respect and tolerance.

Not that much of that happened “back in the day.” There was little tolerance for the views of dissenters then and there is little tolerance for dissent now. However, I applaud President-Elect Obama for bringing conflicting opinions to the White House so that, perhaps, his administration can show the rest of us how to enage amicable disagreement and dissent without being accused of being "godless" or unpatriotic".

Hopefully, that’s what will happen. Otherwise, as Bette Davis’ character said in one of my favorite movies, All About Eve, “Fasten your seatbelts, it’s going to be a bumpy ride!” for the next four to eight years!

DuringKwanzaa I’m Compiling Research for a New Study on ‘Race’

I’m compiling my columns from the past three years into book form in 2009 and plan to lead off with a column I am currently researching that shows how the pro-Obama media manipulated African-Americans into giving up all grounds for racial grievance when they convinced the majority of them that a President they venerated and that some even crowned “America’s first black President” and his wife, who opposed the first viable African-American candidate for President were both racists and played the dreaded “race card” during the primary elections.

My study of how we lost the battle against racism this year won’t be as long as Dr. Price’s, but I hope it will be as comprehensive. It was inspired by assertions from several folks that "racism is over." First, an African-American member of the House made this statement after the election on a television news program.

Then, recently, a young African-American woman in her thirties made the same statment. Well, racism is not over, but these two people from different generations may be right about one thing: our protestations about race may fall of deaf ears after African-Americans lost credability this year denouncing as racists the Clintons, who many once revered in much the same way they now revere Obama.

Before the New Year: “Should Old Acquaintances Be Forgot & Never Brought to Mind,” a Euphemism for Cutting Old Ties, Starting Anew

I had a very eventful year in 2008. I retired from working for nearly seventeen years at an agency doing work I loved and that was becoming more stressful than I realized until I stopped doing it. I’ve also had to come to terms with my mortality and frailty as arthritis seems to take over my joints and change the way I do things and well as the amount of things I do.

Although retirement has not brought me less activity (I’m actually busier now!), it has definitely brought me less stress. The greatest thing it brought me was the opportunity to do the things that I had been waiting until retirement to do: write plays, novels, & books, and start my own business. Well, I’ve re-written a play (I’m still working on it!), a short novel, and a curriculum guide for day habs for people with developmental disabilities, and am about to start that business.

Next year, I’ll be assisting someone else to write a novel, writing another curriculum guide, finish re-writing that play, write a book of short stories which will end with the novella (short novel) I wrote this year, compile my one-act plays into a book, and complete the research for the title piece for a compilation of my columns into book form. I may even finish that historical novel I started eighteen years ago and actually type the rest of the MOSES AT GETHSEMANE Trilogy that blended together form a 90-minute drama.

I am also going to publish my short mystical exercise, “The Nine Cards,” for those of you who like spiritual works and try to get my children’s story “The Slave Princess,” illustrated and published. I have big plans for 2009, and because I’m retired, only working 20 hours or less per week, I have time to do it all!

I enjoyed a moment of pure bliss this past week, sitting alone in my hotel room, when I realized I’m doing exactly what I want to do and just how blessed I am to have the life I want to have, to be at peace, and to have time to do the things I’ve waited over thirty years to do. I knew more joy in that moment than I have ever experienced from being “in love,” getting a job I wanted and doing it well, receiving honors and accolades, or even from my many friendships.

All of the above come and go, but the joy I experienced and which is coming over me as I write this, like the family that I love more and more each day, is mine to keep. I thank God for my family, for joy, for peace, and for giving me the time to embrace all three.

2008-12-15T05:55:00.001-08:00

CHIT-CHAT by Geoyce Chatman ©12/15/08, gjc

AMERICA’S FIRST BLACK PRESIDENT DISSES AFRICAN-AMERICAN SEEKING TO REPLACE HIM IN THE SENATE!

Jesse Jackson, Jr., in my opinion, gave the best speech at the 2008 Democratic Convention. It was even more moving than Barack Obama’s “keynote” address at the 2004 convention, which in affect, introduced America to its first black President (and as if we weren’t already thinking it, reporters at the scene made sure they told us). I thought at the time that Jackson should have been the keynote speaker at the 2008 convention, but was not surprised that someone was picked who had no chance of overshadowing Obama’s tepid acceptance speech. Jackson’s support of Obama throughout the campaign was unquestioning. He dissed his own father when the senior Jackson made disparaging remarks near an open mic about the candidate!

So why didn’t the President-Elect who magnanimously buried the hatchet and selected Joe Biden as his running mate and Hillary Clinton as his Secretary of State not have Jesse Jackson Jr. on his list of people he’d like to see take his Senate seat?
Does he perhaps feel threatened by this vibrant, electrifying young African-American (descendant of slaves) whose oratorical skills surpass every politician on the scene, outshine his father’s by far, and are approaching MLK’s? Many want us to believe that Barack Obama is the “dream” of the Civil Rights movement (and he is, on the “descendants of slave owners” side of the table), but Jesse Jackson, Jr. and a small cadre of up and coming young African-American politicians that includes Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick, Newark Mayor Corey Booker, and former Tennessee Congressman Harold Ford, Jr., really are the dream on the “descendants of slaves” side of the table.

While many in the media feel that Jackson’s chances to take Obama’s place in the Senate have been dashed due to the taped remarks by Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich that “candidate 5’s” emissaries offered him a million bucks, the young Congressman’s candor and immediate statement declaring that he made no attempts to “pay to play” may garner him respect from his constituents in the long run. The same media pundits who’ve doomed Jackson’s Senate chances seem reluctant to comment on the President-Elect’s slowness to make any statements regarding any contacts between his people and Rod Blagojevich. Unless you’re watching Morning Joe on MSNBC, or, God forbid, Fox News Channel, you probably won’t hear any calls for our future President to straighten out this matter once and for all. (Did anyone see our President-Elect walk off the stage when he finally consented to call on a Fox reporter at one of his many recent press conferences? Since he can’t get by with answering “present” any more, I guess President-Elect Obama decided the best course of action was to not be present!)

As was pointed out by columnist Eugene Robinson from The Washington Post, it is perfectly natural for the President-Elect’s staff to submit a list of people he’d like to see take his place in the Senate. Which brings us back to my original question: Why wasn’t Jesse Jackson on Obama’s list of people he’d like to be considered to replace in him the Senate? (Wonder what part of Obama’s body Jesse Sr. wants to cut off now!) I see a pattern by President-Elect Obama regarding African-American men. First he talks about African-American men, not men in general, taking more responsibility for their families, despite a glowing example of an African-American man who did just that in his own wife’s father, as well as countless others if he just looked past his own personal experience. Now, despite having appointed several African-American males to his cabinet, he has failed to recommend a qualified African-American male to take his Senate seat.

On the one hand, he is willing to accept the support of African-American males, but he is not willing to give those who are especially capable and may actually be his equal or better as a politician his support. Sounds like a narcissist to me! Look at this definition of narcissistic personality disorder from the Mayo Clinic:
“Narcissistic personality disorder is a mental disorder in which people have an inflated sense of their own importance and a deep need for admiration. They believe that they're superior to others and have little regard for other people's feelings. But behind this mask of ultra-confidence lies a fragile self-esteem, vulnerable to the slightest criticism.” The italics are mine and would explain, if our President-Elect does have this psychological disorder (as I suspect), why he would not want Jesse Jackson to advance. (I bolded the part about the narcissist’s reaction to criticism because it was evident, to me at least, during the campaign that Obama could not abide any criticism whatsoever – remember how he kept talking about Sarah Palin for two whole weeks after the Republican Convention when she did her job as veep and attacked him?)

Another trait of narcissistic personality disorder is envy and/or jealousy of others. Whether or not Obama has this disorder or not, he has some personality or character flaw that forbade him from giving a nod to a loyal supporter and I think we need to ask why. I also think somebody (not the media that’s been in the tank for him from the beginning!) should be investigating just what went on in Chicago that allowed our “change we can believe in” President-Elect to endorse a governor who was already being accused of corruption two years ago. Like they said on Morning Joe this morning, maybe if the networks had sent as many reporters to Chicago during the campaign as they sent to Wasilla, Alaska, we’d know more about Obama’s relationship with
Rod Blagojevich and why he’s not following Jesse Jackson, Jr.’s lead and denying any part of the “pay to play” debacle. I think when it’s all said and done, Jackson will be the one who will be lauded for his immediate respond while our Commander in Chief to be will be criticized (not by the mainstream media!) for doing what he did when he was in the Illinois Senate: just being “present.”

WHY I'M NOT WRITING THIS COLUMN UNTIL FURTHER NOTICE

2008-12-14T08:57:00.000-08:00

Lori,

Have you heard anything yet? I really think you have a good chance of getting the job as Program Director at NODC. I’m attaching my curriculum guide for you and I’m sending it to Betsy, also, to share with the folks at Holland since they are mentioned (not by name) in it. It’s a chronicle of my year helping to supervise “change” at Holland Road and a record of our successes.

Sorry I haven’t called. I got back to Toledo December 2, and I’ve been swamped with work and projects. I just created programs for an arts initiative, a volunteer effort, and certification in adult transition habilitation for young adults, all with accompanying curricula. Plus I’m the ghost writer for a fictionalized version of the story of a man who spent nineteen years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit.

I’m also trying to finish a novel about vampires (yes, vampires!) before February so I can enter it in a writing contest, shopping around for producers and drama publications for my FINALLY re-written play, and marketing my curriculum guide. And I still have a business to get off the ground on top of all that. We got the Medicare waiver, but it’s going to take about a year to get certified.

I knew I was busy last night when I sat at the desk in my hotel room eating my dinner while I created an ad for the program for this year’s Kwanzaa celebration. Don’t forget – December 26-January 1 is Kwanzaa! I’ll be teaching a behavior class ten hours a day during the holiday for three of those days and observing a quiet, reflective observance of Jesus’ coming into this world Christmas week somewhere other than my house – probably at my favorite retreat: the Secor Comfort Inn.

I’m in “retreat” now, typing 35 pages of email addresses so I can send out promotional materials to all of the day hab programs in the state. I finished 17 pages yesterday and have another 18 to go. There are about 12 listings on each page, so I’m inputting over 400 entries! Hey, it’s cheaper and actually less time consuming than sending out printed pages through snail mail. I’m also offering those who want to order the book the opportunity to have it emailed for a discounted price to save money on printing copies.

I’m missing all my favorite holiday events, like a concert I’d love to go today, but I still have all that typing to do and while I’m here, I’m also reading a stack of material about the incarceration and ultimate release of Danny Brown, the gentleman I’m assisting with writing his story. I’m making a timeline of the events as they occurred to keep everything in perspective. His story is a very compelling one and I’m honored to be involved with helping him to tell it.

I was at Holland Road with our young adult group Thursday for their holiday celebration. We went to Golden Corral first and ran into half of the Lott Industries Hill Plant – the community employees and staff. Our young adults had a great time and want to go back to the Holland plant again. Julie (my former hab tech) and I are going to start a pen pal program between the employees at Holland and our young adults and arrange to have participants socialize at both sites next year.

I saw Mary Katherine and was told by some of my staff that she’s “a white Geneva,” meaning they like her! I knew she was the right person to take my place. She wants the three of us to get together. Of course, everybody told me how much they miss me. I got to see almost everybody, except for Kathy who was at a meeting. Betty offered me money to come back and even jokingly attempted to solicit donations. I told them there’s not enough money in the world to get me back at the county board.

I’m working harder now than I did when I worked seven days a week because I have so many projects, but I don’t have any of the stress of working for the county board or the expense for working for the paper, trying to get to and from assignments and get to the office to get them typed with only fifty dollars to pay for it all. I never made any money, even though I loved the work. I just can’t afford it any more.

I’m going on a very strict budget next year while we get the home health business off the ground and my New Year's resolution is to save ten percent of my salary (Susie Orman's recommendation). I'm paying off all of my credit cards and accounts by the end of the year. That will make it a lot easier to stay within my budget. However, my budget will have to include a monthly visit to my “retreat.” Some things I just can’t do without!

By the way, Lee was at Holland, too, and so was Rick. I heard Gary was there before I got there. Everyone was glad to see so many of their former supervisors show up to visit. It was like a “management reunion.” Lee had two more stories for me to read and they were very good. I told her she should compile her short stories into a book. (That’s another of my projects- writing a book of short stories about the rural community where I grow up, along with compiling a book of autobiographical one act plays).

Oh, I saw products from Holland’s art studio while I was there Thursday and was duly impressed. You’d love the art program we started last week at the young adult center. We actually started our “arts program” last summer with music therapy, having my friend Kewape come in and play African drums to teach the concept of rhythm, connecting percussion sounds with movement and vocalization. Now, I’m teaching art history/appreciation using a hands-on method.

I found these “adult” coloring books at www.amazon.com that have black and white versions of classical artworks. Individuals are given a chart showing slides of the originals and choose which one they’d like to duplicate using their own coloring ideas. Then while they color with color pencils and markers, I tell them about each of the paintings, the artist, and the art form and medium. This is an introduction to art that I hope will include learning to actually create original works when we get the money to hire real artists to work with them.

You’ll also love the volunteer program we’re developing. It’s to provide assistance for seniors and others on fixed incomes who have pets. We’re soliciting donations of pet food to distribute to those who can’t afford to buy it. I came up with the idea of starting a pet food pantry when my neighbors told me they had to feed half their Thanksgiving dinner to their two dogs and cat because they didn’t have money to buy food for them.

I talked to the young adults to see if this is something they’d like to do and almost all of them said yes. I’ve written the curriculum and made up flyers for donations and distribution. We'll be opening the pantry next year when, according to the economists, things are going to get a whole lot worse. Many people may have a hard time buying food for themselves, so I'm sure buying pet food will be a real burden.

I also want to do some improvisational drama, eventually, and I plan to start teaching a writing program using journaling and other fun kinds of writing to assess writing skills and then focus in on those that need honing. I found some “anti-coloring” books that are meant for kids, but are great vehicles for allowing self-expression either through art or writing. I only work at the center fifteen to twenty hours a week, depending on what needs to be done, but I’ve been spending more of my time interacting with the young adults.

Of course, I love teaching, so I’m in my element. My goal, however, is to get the staff to take over some of the therapeutic activities I’ve started. They’re really good and I know once they have the training, they’ll be able to do all of it themselves. They already do great things. However, with such a diverse and highly functioning group, we have to provide a wide variety of choices to keep them engaged.

I did take two hours off last night after typing and reading all day to watch Will Smith in “I Am Legend.” It was worth it. The movie is really good – scary, but very good! I went to one movie while I was in Columbus with my brother James and my brother Joseph’s significant other Leslie. James made us a gourmet dinner at his house, then we went to see “Happy Go Lucky,” a British comedy.

I love British movies. They are usually so well scripted and lack the pretentiousness of American films. My only other outings in Columbus were to James’ church and lunch afterwards, and shopping at the J.C. Penny outlet with my mother and sister. But I don't go "home" to do anything except hang out with my mom and any other family members who happen to come by. Mostly, that's my niece and nephew, Kiki and Joe. They are really growing up; every time I see them, they're two inches taller!

Oh, I fell in love while I was in Columbus. He’s blonde, muscular, and has brown, soulful eyes. He was hostile to me at first, but he was soon licking my face (and feet) and biting my knuckles playfully. His name is “Bear” and he’s a Chow-Golden Retriever mix. He’s only eight months old, but he’s already huge. Bear is Mom’s companion and “grand-dog.” My sister Debbie is his owner. That dog barked at me for three whole days until he decided I wasn’t going to leave.

When I told Mom on the phone that I was going to say I fell in love with a blonde named “Bear” who licked my face and bit my knuckles, she said, “Some guy is going to show up at your door saying he loves women who like being licked!” I also met a couple of toddlers whose mother is my mom’s home health care aide. They are one and a half and two and a half. I wanted to kidnap the two and a half year old and bring him back to Toledo! His mother thought I was kidding. Well, I was, but he is just the cutest child.

I had a great time with my family. I really do love them. I spent a lot of time with my mom and Debbie and some quality time with James and Joseph, as well as Leslie and Joseph’s ex-wife Valerie and their two children. They are all avid Obama supporters and they know I’m not. However, there was never any attempt to ambush me or “gang up” on me, even though they’ve read my columns criticizing him and calling him a narcissist and a megalomaniac. (By the way, Illionis governor Rod Blagojevish is the perfect example of a narcissistic megalomaniac:
I've attached a detailed definition of narcissism from the Mayo Clinic.)

Not that I didn’t have a few heated debates with family members about our opposing views, but there was no concerted effort to “check me” or “straighten” out my opinions about The Chose One. I did get some Obama-themed Christmas gifts, but not the lectures or “interventions” I might have gotten had a spent time during the holidays with Obama supporters other than my own beloveds. My real friends have also been very kind, considering I don’t share their love of Obama.

Some other folks are waiting for the opportunity to “beat up” on me for my dissenting views. I suspect one or two folks of plotting to lure me into settings where I can be “set straight” about my political views. Of course, I won’t be falling for such an obvious trap. Anyone who attempts this really doesn't want to "corner" me; they may think they do, but they really don't. It would be kind of like cornering a wild animal. Have you ever seen anyone corner a raccoon?

They usually come out fighting, clawing and biting! Believe me, no one really wants to see that side of me. Not even me! That's why I resigned rather than "fighting" to keep my job. I hate my evil side and I try to keep it at bay. I have been very successful at not "going off" for quite a while now and I know had I stayed at Holland, even without having to "fight," the stress would have made me show the side of me I've only shown at work once - when I was at Larc Lane School years ago and a teacher (we won't name names) took out her frustrations on me.

I lost it and it took a psychologist, another behavior specialist, and three hours for me to calm down. Afterwards, half the staff was scared of me and the other half left me alone. A gym teacher and a communication specialist I had been having lunch with every day until then started avoiding me, and one of the secretary's who is a friend told me I was completely out of control. I know I was. That's why I don't like losing control because when I do, I lose it completely. It runs in the family.

My mother cannot allow herself to worry or grieve because when she did after her father died, she had a breakdown and has been taking antedepressants for the past fifty years. The reason I know so much about psychological disorders is because I've witnessed them in my own family. By the way, my schizophrenic sister contacted all of us during the holidays, asking for money. She hit pay dirt finally when she called Mom and got money from her and Joseph and Debbie.

She left messages for me on my home phone, but I just had her number blocked because she still hasn't apologized for sending everyone on my email list one of her maniacal rants last year. She's living in a shelter in San Francisco now and she did send a thank-you card to Mom, Joseph, and Debbie and ten dollars for Mom. However, a week later, she was back to ranting and raving. Every time she's lucid, my mother hopes she'll stay that way this time. I used to be on that merry-go-round, too, until I realized she's never going to change.

I understand her psychological condition, but handling it is another matter altogether. That's why when I see symptoms of psychological problems in public officials, I tend to react. People have no idea how dangerous it is to give a psychologically impaired person unlimited power, particularly one who lusts for power and feels superior to everyone and that he's "chosen." I fear our President-Elect may have some issues that really need to be addressed and monitored. I hope his "handlers" can keep him from stepping over the line.

I do wish the next administration well trying to bail us out of this economic crisis, however, (and hope it doesn’t end up a “fail-out” like the efforts to help the auto industry) and I applaud the selection of so many women to fill cabinet positions. I don’t dislike Obama (like I used to dislike George Bush- I don’t even dislike him any more); I just don’t worship at the altar of Barack and I probably never will, even if he turns out to be a great President. I wasn’t a fan of Bill Clinton either as well liked as he was. I always admired his wife; him, not so much.

By the way, I think Hillary’s chances of running for President have been circumvented by Caroline Kennedy’s interest in politics. I’m sure if Caroline takes Hillary’s Senate seat, she will follow in Obama’s footsteps and in two years we’ll see her mounting a Presidential campaign, which, of course, he will endorse, returning the favor she did him; and she will be nominated and elected as America’s first female President. I may live to see a female President of this country after all, in eight years!

The only way it will be Hillary is if Obama melts down (as I fear he will – that’s what narcissists do!) and Biden becomes President, then chooses Hillary as his vice. I doubt that Biden would run in 2012, but Hillary might if she’s the vice. Just musings, not wishful thinking, believe it or not. I’m not really invested in who runs or wins any more. I stopped caring after the Democratic Convention when women were looked over for the Democratic ticket. Now it’s all theatre to me. I just watch the drama and pray we don’t elect an idiot who’ll start a nuclear war.

Enough about politics. I’m just rambling because I don’t have time to write my column or do my blogs because I’M SO BUSY! I’ll call when I have a minute to breathe. I haven’t been returning calls or seeing anyone I don’t work with or see in the course of working since I got back. I mostly communicate with people through email because I really don’t have time to talk on the telephone. I spend all my time at home writing (I’ve got less than two months to write that novel and type it) and away from home, I’m always working on something.

Let me know when you hear about the job!

Geneva

And The Winner Is...

2008-11-10T12:19:00.001-08:00

CHIT-CHAT BY G. CHATMAN
© gjc, 11/8/08
MY MAN WINS!

It was a long, tough battle! But when it was finally over this week, my man won! The two contestants faced off in the final stretch of the competition and everyone knew the young, classy, thoughtful one was the projected winner. But my money was on the guy with the experience who’d been described by his critics as sometimes “erratic” (they also used that term to describe the only woman in the final match!).

When it was all over, the winner said of his chief opponent, “I think he's a really great guy. I think he's young and doesn't have a lot of life experience yet but he's a great guy and he has a great future ahead of him.” I agree. Experience trumped youth as it should and the youngster will be around to try again while the seasoned professional now has the opportunity to realize his dreams and do what he’s been waiting to do all his life. All because of a contest that seemed to go on forever and that was full of drama with back-stabbing, negative attacks, and seemingly unfair criticism my guy received at times.

However, in the end my guy, Nathan Thomas won TopDesign, Wednesday, November 5th, beating out “Pristine Preston,” the twenty-something with impeccable taste, an incredible sense of design, and rooms that looked like they should be in a magazine. However, Nathan, the “erratic” one, has that edginess and artistic flare that I love in design. His designs were always a surprise, even when they fell short of being great. When they were great, they presented new ideas or old ones in novel and unexpected ways. Congratulations, Nathan! As for the other contest that ended this week, I’ll write about that later…

Post-Election Reflections

2008-11-10T07:00:00.001-08:00

CHIT-CHAT BY G. CHATMAN
© gjc, 11/10/08

THE PARTY’S NOT OVER, IT’S JUST BEGINNING!

Last week, two days after the election, I met with students who are taking my behavior support class as a correspondence course to give them their last assignment at Toledo’s Main Library. It took about an hour to go through the fifty or so pages of reading assignments, questions, and quizzes that they have to have completed by December. When we were done, I decided to check my email on one of the library’s computers while waiting for my ride. A young African-American male sat on either side of me using computers. The one on the right leaned over and said, “I have a secret to tell you.” I took the bait and said, “What is it?” He grinned and said, “We have a black President!”

I laughed and said, “Yes, we do don’t we? Only in America! No European country has ever elected a minority for the top job. That’s what I love about this country!” He and the young man to my left both smiled. Like many of the African-American men I saw that day and the day before, they seemed to walk a little taller and hold their heads up a little higher. I was happy for them and thankful to President-Elect Obama and the nation that elected him its first black President for making African-American men, who may have never felt their value, understand it, possibly for the first time.

The night of the election, my three younger siblings did a wonderful thing. They spent the evening with a veteran of the Civil Rights Movement: our mother. Realizing early on that Obama was winning the election, they retired early to get up and go to work the next day, leaving Mom alone. So, I was the first person to talk to her when the results of the election became official after the polls closed in California at eleven o’clock. I called her and she was exuberant. I congratulated her on all the work she and my now deceased father did to help make the election of a black President possible. We talked about how Daddy would have rejoiced had he lived to see Obama elected and I hung and called my brother, John, in California to congratulate his state for putting Obama over the top, but didn’t get an answer.

Then, just before one o’clock, when I was finally drifting off to sleep, my telephone rang and my talking caller ID said, “Chapman, John.” I immediately woke up and picked up the phone to find out that my brother, who along with me and James comprised the half of our family who supported Hilary Clinton in the primaries, had just returned from Nevada where he and his son, Shane, who lives there, had been canvassing for votes, knocking on doors and handing out flyers. John canvassed for Obama and Shane, a Mormon and Republican who supported Mitt Romney in the primaries, canvassed for McCain.

John said Shane was very upset when Obama won and said, “He’s going to take all our guns!” John, who loves a good argument (you should have heard the two of us growing up!) said he and Shane bantered back and forth about politics while he was there; and John, being a parent, was delighted to see his son so involved in the political process. I think it’s also possible that he has learned what I’ve learned: that people on the opposite side of your political opinion aren’t necessarily evil. He loves his son and knows Shane is a good man, who takes care of his family (he’s married with two kids), and who just happens to disagree with his dad about politics.

I really hope we all learn this lesson during a time when we as a nation really need to unite to solve our problems. Our President-Elect seems to be interested in uniting the country and reached out to those who didn’t support him or vote for him in his acceptance speech. His opponent also showed his willingness to work with the man he described as “my opponent who is now my President” in his concession speech. The rest of the nation should follow the lead of these two men as our new President prepares to assume the mantle of leadership of this nation.

I know most of us are just thinking about the Inaugural Ball and all the after parties right now, but we need to get out of party mode for a minute and think of the daunting tasks that our new President faces. Somehow, because they believe in him, most people think everything is just going to fall into place and the formidable problems with the economy, the job market, and the housing market, not to mention health care and national security, will be solved easily and with little effort by a man far more intelligent and focused than anyone who’s been in the White House in eight years. I think some people are looking at the Obama Presidency like an episode of “The Cosby Show” when no matter what problem faced the Huxtables, it was all resolved at the end of the half hour sitcom. Instead of half hour, we’re giving President Obama four years, but the economic crisis which began even before President Bush became President cannot be completely solved in one term. Neither can health care, the housing crisis, and our national security issues.

Most of us just assume that President Obama will be in office eight years anyway, so we think he’ll have plenty of time to solve all the nation’s problems. I only ask that you remember Toledo’s first strong black mayor, Jack Ford. He had a huge mess to clean up after two terms of Carty Finkbeiner and when he couldn’t get it all cleaned up in one term, Toledoans threw him out and re-elected Carty! Now, the nation can’t and wouldn’t re-elect George Bush, but it will put a Republican back in office if they don’t think President Obama solved all the nation’s problems during his first term. Of course that’s not fair, but Americans are used to quick fixes and instant oatmeal. We want everything right now and when we don’t get it, we move on to the next quick fix promise.

There’s also the issue of race, which may not have been a big issue in Obama’s first Presidential campaign, but that doesn’t mean it won’t be an issue in the second one. Majority Whip Jim Clyburn said on “Morning Joe” that the election of Barack Obama as President puts racism “behind us.” I think not. While I think Obama is not viewed primarily as a black man by most Americans, the rest of us are still black and if you don’t think so, look at our justice system that has given harsher treatment to blacks and Hispanics historically. There are some signs that this is changing, but the changes are slow to come. My recent experience on the job tells me that racism is still very much ahead of many of us.

At my previous job, a director, who was a white female who happened to have been a Civil Rights activist, was committed to hiring qualified African-Americans for management positions and she did so. The building where I worked lost all five of its managers to retirement and African-Americans were hired by the director for four of the five management positions, including the top position which was given to an African-American male. Unfortunately, the director retired and I became the first casualty of her efforts to bring equality to an agency that has as one of its core values “cultural competence” when I did not get enrolled in a class I needed for certification until the week my certification expired. Having taught people in my behavior support classes after they’d been terminated when they did not get their certification in time and needed to take a class to get certified and re-hired, I really didn’t think there would be a problem since I was actually taking the class I needed to get my certification. However, it was a big problem for the HR department and I would have had to take legal action in order to keep my job, so I resigned.

Since I left, the African-American male who ran my facility has been moved to a smaller facility by HR and an African-American staff who I asked to teach a health education class and who turned that class into a health education program, winning the agency’s highest award last spring, has been targeted by HR and is shutting down her program. Now, none of this may have anything to do with racism, but since all three incidents involve African-Americans being targeted by the same department after the director who supported all three of us wholeheartedly retired, one has to wonder. This is just one example of the kind of subtle, but real dilemmas African-Americans face every day in America and I don’t think this will stop because we have a black President. Perversely, some of these insidious tactics may increase as a kind of backlash to President Obama’s election and may even become more blatantly racist.

My point is that there remains an undercurrent of racism in our culture and although it seems to not have touched our newly elected President before now, if he does not perform up to the expectations of the majority of Americans, racism could rear its ugly head the next time he runs and, like Jack Ford, everybody will be blaming “the black guy” in the White House for everything that’s wrong with the country. There’s little we can do about that. What we can do is get our heads out of the clouds and between celebrations, parties, and throw downs, take a sobering look at the state of affairs in this country and do everything – not a couple of things – everything we can to help bring about the changes the President has promised.

This means we can’t sit back and wait for him to “save us.” Instead, we have to be active participants in our rescue and the country’s rescue from the economic crisis, the health care crisis, the housing crisis, and the war in Iraq. It means if you voted for Barack Obama and you want his Presidency to succeed, you have to do some things to help and that means changing your lifestyle and making some sacrifices while we work our way out of this economic crisis. First, we all need to get out of debt, if we can. Next, everyone needs to have a savings account in case of job loss or other unforeseen economic problems. Then, we need to cut back on our spending. Stop buying everything you think you want! Keep that old klunker you’ve been driving and put off buying clothes one more year. Don’t spend thousands of dollars buying your kids Christmas present this year – buy them one nice gift and some socks and underwear like parents did when I was a child.

This is just the tip of the iceberg, folks! We’re not going to get out of the economic crisis buying the latest Jordans and Baby Phat leather jackets. Treat your money as if it is the last you’ll ever have and hold on to it. Believe me, this is hard for me to do, too. Money has never meant anything to me, so I’ve spent every cent I’ve ever had until now. Now, I have a savings account and although I’ve spent a lot of money giving to others and helping family and friends, I am paying off my credit cards and not buying expensive clothes now that I can finally afford to buy new ones. I’m also not buying the new furniture I need – yet! I’m waiting until my business starts to make a profit. I’ve also invested in real estate with my brother, Joseph, and continue to get real estate tips from my brother John, a realtor in California who is always calling me up telling me about houses he sees for sale in Toledo online.

Supporting the new President will take a lot more than celebrating January 20th and just being happy that a black man is in the White House. Although I didn’t support him in the primaries and did not vote for him November 4th (despite a robo-call from Michelle Obama that almost convinced me, when I got to the voting booth, I had to vote for Cynthia McKinney – the only woman running for President this year!), like John McCain, I accept Barack Obama as my President and I will support him. (I accepted George Bush as my President for eight years despite my intense dislike of him due to the mess he made of my home state and his invasion of Iraq, so, believe me, accepting Barack Obama as my President is a piece of cake compared to swallowing that pill!) Supporting the President means I will make the sacrifices he asks me to make. It also means I will question his policies when I have questions about them. No, he won’t get a pass because he’s black.

Neither will we. Those of you who wanted reparations for slavery can forget about that now. All those folks tired of us talking about slavery and what we’re owed because the slaves were freed and never given anything for their two centuries of labor that helped to build this county (not even the 40 acres and a single mule that was proposed as just payment to each slave family, but was never approved by the U.S. government) feel they paid up when they elected a black President. James said a speaker at his UCC church in Columbus brought the house down yesterday when she said, “We may not have gotten our 40 acres and our mule, but we did get 50 states and a White House!” In other words, you wanted a black President and you got him. So, that settles it – no more talk about reparations, racism, or affirmative action, black folks. You have seen the Promised Land! If only all our problems could be solved just by putting a black man in the White House – that’s a lovely dream, but I don’t think it’s the one Dr. King had.

Part of Dr. King’s dream did come true this year when a man was judged by his character and not the color of his skin as Americans went to the polls and elected the person they thought could best lead the nation. That alone is reason to celebrate! So, let’s party January 20th like it’s 1999! Then, a week later, when your hangover and/or euphoria of seeing a black man sworn in as President of the United States wears off and you can think straight again, let’s get down to the business of helping our new President by stepping up to the plate and doing our part as he prepares to govern this nation. Can you spell s-a-c-r-i-f-i-c-e? Even more importantly, can you do it? Can you sacrifice your needs and put the needs of the nation first for just a little while? Our forefathers did it when they sacrificed to put children through college, build businesses, and saved to buy a house. They didn’t have sub-prime loans that allowed them to buy houses they couldn’t afford with no down payment. No, they had to have money to put down on their little modest homes and they saved that money and bought those homes. That’s the mindset we’re going to have to have for at least the next few years.

Can you we do it? As President Obama told us over and over during his campaign -
YES WE CAN!