Why wouldn't you want to add a potential Six Figure yearly revenue stream?
Saturday, November 21, 2009
Thursday, November 19, 2009
I Owe This Man An Apology
I didn't know who Mike Woodson was when the Hawks hired him 5 years ago. And I'd like to think I judged him on his body of work over the first few years as head coach of my Atlanta Hawks. But now I think I may have been a bit too harsh. He had a very young group to work with, and what I termed as squandering talent, now appears to have been much more of a maturation process. Add to that, the general manager hadn't been very good at building a complete team, rather we had a habit of just trying to get a good player, whether or not it fit into some coherent and cohesive team building strategy.
Well, you know how us fan(atic)s get sometimes. I'm pretty sure I publicly called for Woodson's firing on more than one occassion, in terms that bordered on inciting a riot. I blamed the man for making basketball hard for me to watch, and I really didn't watch too much Hawks ball between 2003 and 2006, because I was disgusted with the team I had grown up loving.
So Woody, I apologize. I'm a big enough man to admit publicly when I have wronged someone. And I wronged you man. I bad mouthed this cat like nobody's business, talked about him on blogs all over the place like he stole my woman and shot my dog. You probably got ulcers from dealing with the stress fans like me put on your head over the past few years. I can't change the past, but I'm gonna back up off you now and give you the props you deserve for turning this team around.
Well, you know how us fan(atic)s get sometimes. I'm pretty sure I publicly called for Woodson's firing on more than one occassion, in terms that bordered on inciting a riot. I blamed the man for making basketball hard for me to watch, and I really didn't watch too much Hawks ball between 2003 and 2006, because I was disgusted with the team I had grown up loving.
So Woody, I apologize. I'm a big enough man to admit publicly when I have wronged someone. And I wronged you man. I bad mouthed this cat like nobody's business, talked about him on blogs all over the place like he stole my woman and shot my dog. You probably got ulcers from dealing with the stress fans like me put on your head over the past few years. I can't change the past, but I'm gonna back up off you now and give you the props you deserve for turning this team around.
Saturday, October 31, 2009
Fast Becoming My Favorite (and only) Source For "News"
This episode of the Daily Show with Jon Stewart is a prime example of why I get most of my current event type information from Comedy Central.
Let's face it. You must be some new kind of fool to believe anything you see or hear in mass media these days. Every single second of what passes for media these days is laced with somebody's agenda, like crack is laced with... well pretty much anything they can find.
And I'm not even saying that Stewart doesn't have an agenda. But at the very least, I can usually count on his show to call bullshit on all the crap that the "mainstream media" tries to foist off as relevant information or news.
And yes, I do indeed consider it a damn shame, and symbolic of the decline of this epoch of civilization, that that my most trusted information source is the only all comedy channel that my cable provider offers.
BTW, NY deserves what they get for electing the richest thief in the city as mayor. Term limits..? We don't need no stinking term limits... lmbao...
Let's face it. You must be some new kind of fool to believe anything you see or hear in mass media these days. Every single second of what passes for media these days is laced with somebody's agenda, like crack is laced with... well pretty much anything they can find.
And I'm not even saying that Stewart doesn't have an agenda. But at the very least, I can usually count on his show to call bullshit on all the crap that the "mainstream media" tries to foist off as relevant information or news.
And yes, I do indeed consider it a damn shame, and symbolic of the decline of this epoch of civilization, that that my most trusted information source is the only all comedy channel that my cable provider offers.
BTW, NY deserves what they get for electing the richest thief in the city as mayor. Term limits..? We don't need no stinking term limits... lmbao...
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
LEARN TO EARN
AN INTENSIVE SEMINAR THAT WILL SHOW YOU HOW TO EARN AT LEAST $10,000 WORKING ONLY THREE MONTHS, EVERY YEAR, FOR AS LONG AS THE U.S. HAS ITS CURRENT INCOME TAX SYSTEM.
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Larry Flynt? Really? Really.
Larry Flynt
Posted: August 20, 2009 at Huffington PostCommon Sense 2009
The American government -- which we once called our government -- has been taken over by Wall Street, the mega-corporations and the super-rich. They are the ones who decide our fate. It is this group of powerful elites, the people President Franklin D. Roosevelt called "economic royalists," who choose our elected officials -- indeed, our very form of government. Both Democrats and Republicans dance to the tune of their corporate masters. In America, corporations do not control the government. In America, corporations are the government.This was never more obvious than with the Wall Street bailout, whereby the very corporations that caused the collapse of our economy were rewarded with taxpayer dollars. So arrogant, so smug were they that, without a moment's hesitation, they took our money -- yours and mine -- to pay their executives multimillion-dollar bonuses, something they continue doing to this very day. They have no shame. They don't care what you and I think about them. Henry Kissinger refers to us as "useless eaters."
But, you say, we have elected a candidate of change. To which I respond: Do these words of President Obama sound like change?
"A culture of irresponsibility took root, from Wall Street to Washington to Main Street."
There it is. Right there. We are Main Street. We must, according to our president, share the blame. He went on to say: "And a regulatory regime basically crafted in the wake of a 20th-century economic crisis -- the Great Depression -- was overwhelmed by the speed, scope and sophistication of a 21st-century global economy."
This is nonsense.
The reason Wall Street was able to game the system the way it did -- knowing that they would become rich at the expense of the American people (oh, yes, they most certainly knew that) -- was because the financial elite had bribed our legislators to roll back the protections enacted after the Stock Market Crash of 1929.
Congress gutted the Glass-Steagall Act, which separated commercial lending banks from investment banks, and passed the Commodity Futures Modernization Act, which allowed for self-regulation with no oversight. The Securities and Exchange Commission subsequently revised its rules to allow for even less oversight -- and we've all seen how well that worked out. To date, no serious legislation has been offered by the Obama administration to correct these problems.
Instead, Obama wants to increase the oversight power of the Federal Reserve. Never mind that it already had significant oversight power before our most recent economic meltdown, yet failed to take action. Never mind that the Fed is not a government agency but a cartel of private bankers that cannot be held accountable by Washington. Whatever the Fed does with these supposed new oversight powers will be behind closed doors.
Obama's failure to act sends one message loud and clear: He cannot stand up to the powerful Wall Street interests that supplied the bulk of his campaign money for the 2008 election. Nor, for that matter, can Congress, for much the same reason.
Consider what multibillionaire banker David Rockefeller wrote in his 2002 memoirs:
"Some even believe we are part of a secret cabal working against the best interests of the United States, characterizing my family and me as 'internationalists' and of conspiring with others around the world to build a more integrated global political and economic structure -- one world, if you will. If that's the charge, I stand guilty, and I am proud of it."
Read Rockefeller's words again. He actually admits to working against the "best interests of the United States."
Need more? Here's what Rockefeller said in 1994 at a U.N. dinner: "We are on the verge of a global transformation. All we need is the right major crisis, and the nations will accept the New World Order." They're gaming us. Our country has been stolen from us.
Journalist Matt Taibbi, writing in Rolling Stone, notes that esteemed economist John Kenneth Galbraith laid the 1929 crash at the feet of banking giant Goldman Sachs. Taibbi goes on to say that Goldman Sachs has been behind every other economic downturn as well, including the most recent one. As if that wasn't enough, Goldman Sachs even had a hand in pushing gas prices up to $4 a gallon.
The problem with bankers is longstanding. Here's what one of our Founding Fathers, Thomas Jefferson, had to say about them:
"If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issuance of their currency, first by inflation, and then by deflation, the banks and the corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all property until their children wake up homeless on the continent their father's conquered."
We all know that the first American Revolution officially began in 1776, with the Declaration of Independence. Less well known is that the single strongest motivating factor for revolution was the colonists' attempt to free themselves from the Bank of England. But how many of you know about the second revolution, referred to by historians as Shays' Rebellion? It took place in 1786-87, and once again the banks were the cause. This time they were putting the screws to America's farmers.
Daniel Shays was a farmer in western Massachusetts. Like many other farmers of the day, he was being driven into bankruptcy by the banks' predatory lending practices. (Sound familiar?) Rallying other farmers to his side, Shays led his rebels in an attack on the courts and the local armory. The rebellion itself failed, but a message had been sent: The bankers (and the politicians who supported them) ultimately backed off. As Thomas Jefferson famously quipped in regard to the insurrection: "A little rebellion now and then is a good thing. The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."
Perhaps it's time to consider that option once again.
I'm calling for a national strike, one designed to close the country down for a day. The intent? Real campaign-finance reform and strong restrictions on lobbying. Because nothing will change until we take corporate money out of politics. Nothing will improve until our politicians are once again answerable to their constituents, not the rich and powerful.
Let's set a date. No one goes to work. No one buys anything. And if that isn't effective -- if the politicians ignore us -- we do it again. And again. And again.
The real war is not between the left and the right. It is between the average American and the ruling class. If we come together on this single issue, everything else will resolve itself. It's time we took back our government from those who would make us their slaves.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
This is Same Stuff Different Day for Most in Black America
Frankly, I'm shocked that Skip Gates has the gall to be shocked.
Anyone who didn't already know that there is a different standard of policing in low-income and minority areas will learn absolutely nothing from this incident. It is apparent from the comments here that few people following this situation in the media or cyberspace have ever been accosted by the police simply because of what they looked like or where they happened to be. For a significant part of the population this is simply business as usual. And before it happened to Skip Gates, he was more or less blissfully unaware of the prevalence and pervasive nature of this type of police work.
And now in light of Dr. Gates personal experience, we will have yet another disjointed and eventually aborted attempt at dialogue about racial profiling. When the problem is not, at it's core, racial profiling. The problem is that we live in a police state; and most of us support the police state because we have been convinced by mainstream media and lying politicians that society is one short step away from anarchy and the only way to save ourselves is to outlaw everything, and allow the state power over freedom, life, and death. Of course, the people who support all the wars on various crimes, and the implementation of more and more laws believe this is the only way to keep themselves safe, and they further believe that only criminals suffer from the application of criminal law, and of course criminals deserve to suffer.
80% of the so-called "crimes" prosecuted are economic crimes. That is they are motivated or exacerbated by economic distress and difficulty. For example the police don't routinely run roadblocks in more affluent areas because they realize that affluent people are less likely to have status offenses like no insurance or unpaid tickets. These types of offenses criminalize poverty and have little if any impact on the state of law and order in any area. As example again, the only kind of insurance that is legally required is literally insurance to cover health costs in an accident, and in a country that should have universal health care, that type of insurance should be totally unnecessary. But having all these b.s. laws on the books gives the police an excuse to interpose themselves more or less indiscriminately into the lives of the people in the neighborhoods they are tasked to control. To pretend that these incursions against personal freedoms are somehow tied to a desire to lower crime rates is intellectually dishonest at best. It is common knowledge that affluent Caucasion Americans use and distribute the most illegal drugs, but it is equally well known that poor Black and Brown men are the overwhelming majority of those investigated and institutionalized in the fictitious war on drugs.
Dr. Gates wasn't a criminal, and yet he was made to suffer because of the mentality that permeates the police forces in America. It's a mentality that portrays them as the last line of defense against the ever encroaching hordes of murderers, thieves, rapists, and druggies. It's a fallacy, and the real problem is too many laws, and too many police unleashed on depressed and deprived neighborhoods in an obvious effort to keep those people in line.
Anyone who didn't already know that there is a different standard of policing in low-income and minority areas will learn absolutely nothing from this incident. It is apparent from the comments here that few people following this situation in the media or cyberspace have ever been accosted by the police simply because of what they looked like or where they happened to be. For a significant part of the population this is simply business as usual. And before it happened to Skip Gates, he was more or less blissfully unaware of the prevalence and pervasive nature of this type of police work.
And now in light of Dr. Gates personal experience, we will have yet another disjointed and eventually aborted attempt at dialogue about racial profiling. When the problem is not, at it's core, racial profiling. The problem is that we live in a police state; and most of us support the police state because we have been convinced by mainstream media and lying politicians that society is one short step away from anarchy and the only way to save ourselves is to outlaw everything, and allow the state power over freedom, life, and death. Of course, the people who support all the wars on various crimes, and the implementation of more and more laws believe this is the only way to keep themselves safe, and they further believe that only criminals suffer from the application of criminal law, and of course criminals deserve to suffer.
80% of the so-called "crimes" prosecuted are economic crimes. That is they are motivated or exacerbated by economic distress and difficulty. For example the police don't routinely run roadblocks in more affluent areas because they realize that affluent people are less likely to have status offenses like no insurance or unpaid tickets. These types of offenses criminalize poverty and have little if any impact on the state of law and order in any area. As example again, the only kind of insurance that is legally required is literally insurance to cover health costs in an accident, and in a country that should have universal health care, that type of insurance should be totally unnecessary. But having all these b.s. laws on the books gives the police an excuse to interpose themselves more or less indiscriminately into the lives of the people in the neighborhoods they are tasked to control. To pretend that these incursions against personal freedoms are somehow tied to a desire to lower crime rates is intellectually dishonest at best. It is common knowledge that affluent Caucasion Americans use and distribute the most illegal drugs, but it is equally well known that poor Black and Brown men are the overwhelming majority of those investigated and institutionalized in the fictitious war on drugs.
Dr. Gates wasn't a criminal, and yet he was made to suffer because of the mentality that permeates the police forces in America. It's a mentality that portrays them as the last line of defense against the ever encroaching hordes of murderers, thieves, rapists, and druggies. It's a fallacy, and the real problem is too many laws, and too many police unleashed on depressed and deprived neighborhoods in an obvious effort to keep those people in line.
|
And In the category of "I couldn't have said it better myself", this article from Bob Herbert, and this one from Colbert King, are pretty much all the follow-up that is needed to this story. Hat tip P6 for both links
Monday, July 20, 2009
Makheru dropping knowledge
Obama’s Neo-Colonial Mission in AfriKa
Jambo.
Q. Is Obama better than Bush?
A. It depends how you like your imperialism – with a white face or a black one. (Stephen Gowans)
[It was “a message no pink-faced Western leader could have delivered without arousing resentment in Africa and politically correct abuse from hand-wringers at home,” Libby Purves, a columnist for the London Times noted.]
After reading President Obama’s interview with AllAfrica.com, and his speech in Accra, it’s crystal clear why he was chosen to sit on the throne of Anglo American Imperialism.
[I’d say I’m probably as knowledgeable about African history as anybody who’s occupied my office. And I can give you chapter and verse on why the colonial maps that were drawn helped to spur on conflict, and the terms of trade that were uneven emerging out of colonialism.] – President Obama
Anyone who is as “knowledgeable about African history” as the President claims he is, surely knows when he is deliberately revising history and distorting the truth.
[I think part of what’s hampered advancement in Africa is that for many years we’ve made excuses about corruption or poor governance; that this was somehow the consequence of neo-colonialism, or the West has been oppressive, or racism. I’m not a believer in excuses.]—Obama
Of course the colonial system reduced many Afrikan economies to monocultures, economies largely dependent on one cash crop (e.g. cocoa in Ghana), whose prices were then manipulated to destabilize the post-colonial governments of leaders like Kwame Nkrumah, thereby setting the stage for CIA organized coups all over Afrika, which sometimes resulted in assassinations, as was the case with the democratically-elected Patrice Lumumba in the Congo. And all of that was “somehow the consequence of neo-colonialism” which is no excuse for underdevelopment.
Most certainly this student of Afrikan history would not dare to mention the devastating impact that the Structural Adjustment Programs of the IMF have had on Afrikan economies and governance.
However of all of the fork-tongued words spoken by the President, these words capture the essence of his Gobellian propaganda:
“The West and the United States has not been responsible for what’s happened to Zimbabwe’s economy over the last 15 or 20 years.”
So the United States and the United Kingdom did not renege on the Lancaster House Agreement. The United States did not enact “The Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act” in 2001, and President Obama did not renew that Act in March 2009.
[The Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act states that U.S. sanctions will remain in place against the Zimbabwean "government" [euphemism for "the people"] until the U.S. president certifies that the "rule of law has been restored in Zimbabwe, including respect for ownership and title to property. . . and an end to. . .lawlessness."] –Connie White
[President Obama talks of the last 15-20 years as if the problems bedeviling the continent started then. Why the last 15-20 years? Is it because that’s when he developed an interest on the continent? The US system of segregation which started centuries ago is still affecting black people in that country; some of whom live in absolute poverty in a country seen as very rich by the rest of the world. The Apartheid system in South Africa left a dent which the current Government is still battling with. The land problems in Zimbabwe and elsewhere on the African continent started many years ago, not 15-20 years ago.]—Africa Speaks
The objective here is not to absolve Robert Mugabe of his mistakes, the first of which was trusting the Anglo American imperialists by signing the Lancaster House Agreement. However, problems of this magnitude cannot be solved without a clear objective analysis of the historical situation. And on that account, the student of Afrikan History, President Obama, was an abysmal failure or a deliberate liar.
The President also painted a false picture of Afrikan American reality:
“In my country, African-Americans – including so many recent immigrants – have thrived in every sector of society. We have done so despite a difficult past, and we have drawn strength from our African heritage.”
While it’s true that many Afrikan Americans have made enormous material progress since the Civil Rights Movement, that assessment does not capture the total picture. Afrikan Americans are currently suffering Great Depression levels of unemployment.
[The differences in unemployment rates are even more dramatic when broken down by race and age. For example, white men's unemployment rate in June was 9.5%, while black men's was 17.8%. For white women it was 8%, and for black women, 13.1%, according to the U.S. Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Here's a sampling of unemployment rates in June for various groups:
• Black men 20 and older: 16.4%.
• Black women 20 and older: 11.3%.
• White men 20 and older: 9.2%.
• White women 20 and older: 6.8%.
• Black males age 16 to 19: 50%.
• Black females age 16 to 19: 40.6%.
• White males age 16 to 19: 26.5%.
• White females age 16 to 19: 23.5%.]—Market Watch
And these numbers don’t capture the totality of unemployment because they are based on the U3—the official unemployment rate. I would like to see these numbers crunched for the U6 which gives a broader, although not total, scope of unemployment in America.
The Ghana Speech can be read here:
http://enduringamerica.com/2009/07/11/transcript-obama-speech-in-ghana-11-july/
Obama Talks to AllAfrica at the White House:
http://www.africaspeaks.com/blog/?p=2703
Obama’s neocolonial mission in Africa by Ann Talbot:
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2009/jul2009/pers-j16.shtml
As always, your responses and challenges are welcome and appreciated.
Bado Mapambano, Makheru
Jambo.
Q. Is Obama better than Bush?
A. It depends how you like your imperialism – with a white face or a black one. (Stephen Gowans)
[It was “a message no pink-faced Western leader could have delivered without arousing resentment in Africa and politically correct abuse from hand-wringers at home,” Libby Purves, a columnist for the London Times noted.]
After reading President Obama’s interview with AllAfrica.com, and his speech in Accra, it’s crystal clear why he was chosen to sit on the throne of Anglo American Imperialism.
[I’d say I’m probably as knowledgeable about African history as anybody who’s occupied my office. And I can give you chapter and verse on why the colonial maps that were drawn helped to spur on conflict, and the terms of trade that were uneven emerging out of colonialism.] – President Obama
Anyone who is as “knowledgeable about African history” as the President claims he is, surely knows when he is deliberately revising history and distorting the truth.
[I think part of what’s hampered advancement in Africa is that for many years we’ve made excuses about corruption or poor governance; that this was somehow the consequence of neo-colonialism, or the West has been oppressive, or racism. I’m not a believer in excuses.]—Obama
Of course the colonial system reduced many Afrikan economies to monocultures, economies largely dependent on one cash crop (e.g. cocoa in Ghana), whose prices were then manipulated to destabilize the post-colonial governments of leaders like Kwame Nkrumah, thereby setting the stage for CIA organized coups all over Afrika, which sometimes resulted in assassinations, as was the case with the democratically-elected Patrice Lumumba in the Congo. And all of that was “somehow the consequence of neo-colonialism” which is no excuse for underdevelopment.
Most certainly this student of Afrikan history would not dare to mention the devastating impact that the Structural Adjustment Programs of the IMF have had on Afrikan economies and governance.
However of all of the fork-tongued words spoken by the President, these words capture the essence of his Gobellian propaganda:
“The West and the United States has not been responsible for what’s happened to Zimbabwe’s economy over the last 15 or 20 years.”
So the United States and the United Kingdom did not renege on the Lancaster House Agreement. The United States did not enact “The Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act” in 2001, and President Obama did not renew that Act in March 2009.
[The Zimbabwe Democracy and Economic Recovery Act states that U.S. sanctions will remain in place against the Zimbabwean "government" [euphemism for "the people"] until the U.S. president certifies that the "rule of law has been restored in Zimbabwe, including respect for ownership and title to property. . . and an end to. . .lawlessness."] –Connie White
[President Obama talks of the last 15-20 years as if the problems bedeviling the continent started then. Why the last 15-20 years? Is it because that’s when he developed an interest on the continent? The US system of segregation which started centuries ago is still affecting black people in that country; some of whom live in absolute poverty in a country seen as very rich by the rest of the world. The Apartheid system in South Africa left a dent which the current Government is still battling with. The land problems in Zimbabwe and elsewhere on the African continent started many years ago, not 15-20 years ago.]—Africa Speaks
The objective here is not to absolve Robert Mugabe of his mistakes, the first of which was trusting the Anglo American imperialists by signing the Lancaster House Agreement. However, problems of this magnitude cannot be solved without a clear objective analysis of the historical situation. And on that account, the student of Afrikan History, President Obama, was an abysmal failure or a deliberate liar.
The President also painted a false picture of Afrikan American reality:
“In my country, African-Americans – including so many recent immigrants – have thrived in every sector of society. We have done so despite a difficult past, and we have drawn strength from our African heritage.”
While it’s true that many Afrikan Americans have made enormous material progress since the Civil Rights Movement, that assessment does not capture the total picture. Afrikan Americans are currently suffering Great Depression levels of unemployment.
[The differences in unemployment rates are even more dramatic when broken down by race and age. For example, white men's unemployment rate in June was 9.5%, while black men's was 17.8%. For white women it was 8%, and for black women, 13.1%, according to the U.S. Labor Department's Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Here's a sampling of unemployment rates in June for various groups:
• Black men 20 and older: 16.4%.
• Black women 20 and older: 11.3%.
• White men 20 and older: 9.2%.
• White women 20 and older: 6.8%.
• Black males age 16 to 19: 50%.
• Black females age 16 to 19: 40.6%.
• White males age 16 to 19: 26.5%.
• White females age 16 to 19: 23.5%.]—Market Watch
And these numbers don’t capture the totality of unemployment because they are based on the U3—the official unemployment rate. I would like to see these numbers crunched for the U6 which gives a broader, although not total, scope of unemployment in America.
The Ghana Speech can be read here:
http://enduringamerica.com/2009/07/11/transcript-obama-speech-in-ghana-11-july/
Obama Talks to AllAfrica at the White House:
http://www.africaspeaks.com/blog/?p=2703
Obama’s neocolonial mission in Africa by Ann Talbot:
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2009/jul2009/pers-j16.shtml
As always, your responses and challenges are welcome and appreciated.
Bado Mapambano, Makheru
He's Baa-aack!
When Goodell sits down with Vick, there will be stern admonishments by the commissioner, sober mea culpas by the player and, at some point, when Vick signs a contract, guardedly hopeful talk of second chances by the new team. And what will the fans' response be? We hope he's reformed, we hope he's sincere, we hope to hell he doesn't mess up again. But what we really hope is that Michael Vick gives us our thrills on those magical Sunday afternoons this fall.
http://vault.sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1157660/1/index.htm
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