Ramblings' Journal is Still Sleeping

Untitled

Michael — Mon, 15 Aug 2011 13:25:13 +0000

Are you ready?

Michael — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 05:00:12 +0000

Stepping off the liberal plantation

Michael — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 04:32:03 +0000

A white liberal who heard me on the radio years ago called me a sellout and a traitor to my race. At that point, I got insulted, but after a moment of listening to him rant, I had to laugh.

He had the audacity to tell me that I was ungrateful and how dare I question what I had been "given."

Pretty bloody sad if you ask me. I guess I was supposed to bow and scrape and kiss the very ground that liberal walked upon because of what he "sacrificed" for me to be able to vote, let alone think my own mind. Last I checked, he had no connection with my past and had no ground in my upbringing or learning about the difference between following my so-called leaders and discovering how to think for myself and how to make political decisions for myself.

So many liberals, black and white, love to toss names around — Uncle Tom, oreo, sellout, and worse names. I've certainly been called them all by both blacks and whites over the years — as have many black libertarians and conservatives. After all, we have departed the political plantation to live and think for ourselves.

Black Conservatives have chosen to speak out against the black genocide (abortion of black babies), high poverty rates among blacks, the welfare conditions, the poor education system, the removal of God, the high unemployment rates of black men, and basically the continued slavery, period. That is not selling out.

Last I checked, it certainly wasn't selling out — if anything, it was providing additional dialogue that can and will add to the collective intelligence. Ah, but I guess intelligence is not the goal for the nay-sayers, is it?

“I’m as mad as hell and I’m not gonna take this any more!”

Michael — Tue, 26 Jul 2011 00:15:23 +0000

I'm tired of Washington jerking everyone around on this debt ceiling crap. People don't have jobs, people are losing their homes, their ways of life, they can't afford to live the life they've become accustomed to; their credit has gone to shit. It's all gone straight to hell on greased rails.

At this point, I'm almost ready to go Howard Beale on everyone involved. Howard Beale, for those of you who have never heard of him, was an anchorman played by Peter Finch in Paddy Chayefsky's 1976 classic film "Network." Beale, a long-time network anchor, suffers a nervous breakdown on the air shortly after finding out he was being fired due to ratings. Over the course of his rage and alcohol fueled rants, he extols the American public to take action.

I want you to get mad! I don't want you to protest. I don't want you to riot – I don't want you to write to your congressman because I wouldn't know what to tell you to write. I don't know what to do about the depression and the inflation and the Russians and the crime in the street. All I know is that first you've got to get mad. You've got to say, 'I'm a HUMAN BEING, God damn it! My life has VALUE!' So I want you to get up now. I want all of you to get up out of your chairs. I want you to get up right now and go to the window. Open it, and stick your head out, and yell, 'I'M AS MAD AS HELL, AND I'M NOT GOING TO TAKE THIS ANYMORE!' I want you to get up right now, sit up, go to your windows, open them and stick your head out and yell – 'I'm as mad as hell and I'm not going to take this anymore!' Things have got to change. But first, you've gotta get mad!… You've got to say, 'I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not going to take this anymore!' Then we'll figure out what to do about the depression and the inflation and the oil crisis. But first get up out of your chairs, open the window, stick your head out, and yell, and say it: "I'M AS MAD AS HELL, AND I'M NOT GOING TO TAKE THIS ANYMORE!"

And to the surprise of everyone involved, that's exactly what many people across the nation do. It was true in 1976, and it's true today. "I'm as mad as hell, and I'm not gonna take this any more!"

Columnist Jeff Jarvis has gone the same direction — but using Twitter to fuel his fire. Last week, Jarvis tweeted:

“Hey, Washington assholes, it’s our country, our economy, our money. Stop fucking with it.”

He added another key ingredient to the whole shooting match: the hashtag #FUCKYOUWASHINGTON. And you know what? It's taking off. Slowly, of course, at first, but it IS taking off.

So, to match the genius of Jarvis, and to paraphrase Beale, I want you to get mad. I want you to get up now, and get out of your chairs, and go to the proverbial window that is your Twitter feed or TweetDeck or whatever you're using as your personal soapbox. Go ahead and say it with me: #FUCKYOUWASHINGTON — I'M NOT GOING TO TAKE THIS ANY MORE!

The [Conservative] Awakening of Black America

Michael — Mon, 04 Jul 2011 19:04:20 +0000

Many would argue that Black America is already awake and enlightened, while just as many would argue otherwise.

I've said for many years that despite the vilification of black conservative thought, that we as a socio-economic class, will continue to languish as long as we maintain a monolithic mindset and refuse to allow dissenting views to participate constructively in the collective thought process. But there is hope — as noted by Bruce Bialosky's July 4 column for TownHall, "The Awakening of Black America."

The last election had 14 Black Americans running for Congress as Republicans. Two of them, Tim Scott and Allen West, were the first Black Republicans elected to Congress since the retirement of J. C. Watts a decade ago. The census showed a major migration of Black Americans from the cities in the North, where they were treated as wards of the government, to places where there is greater opportunity. And spurred by films such as “Waiting for Superman,” more Black parents are standing up against the Democrat/Education establishment that produces thousands of barely-literate children with a bleak future – if they graduate at all.

Happy birthday America…

Cornel West upset Obama won’t kiss his ring

Michael — Thu, 19 May 2011 21:46:57 +0000

Dr. Cornel West, Harvard scholar and "hyper-black activist" raised a number of concerns about President Obama in an interview this week with left-wing site Truthdig.com.

West was among many notable black intellectuals who campaigned actively for Obama during the 2008 campaign, but have become disillusioned with the President more recently, primarily because Obama does not cater to them directly.

In the Truthdig article, West is quoted as being upset that the president hasn't "thanked" him properly; carping about something as seemingly insignificant as his family not getting inauguration tickets while other people do.

“There is the personal level,” he says. “I used to call my dear brother [Obama] every two weeks. I said a prayer on the phone for him, especially before a debate. And I never got a call back. And when I ran into him in the state Capitol in South Carolina when I was down there campaigning for him he was very kind. The first thing he told me was, ‘Brother West, I feel so bad. I haven’t called you back. You been calling me so much. You been giving me so much love, so much support and what have you.’ And I said, ‘I know you’re busy.’ But then a month and half later I would run into other people on the campaign and he’s calling them all the time. I said, wow, this is kind of strange. He doesn’t have time, even two seconds, to say thank you or I’m glad you’re pulling for me and praying for me, but he’s calling these other people. I said, this is very interesting. And then as it turns out with the inauguration I couldn’t get a ticket with my mother and my brother. I said this is very strange. We drive into the hotel and the guy who picks up my bags from the hotel has a ticket to the inauguration. My mom says, ‘That’s something that this dear brother can get a ticket and you can’t get one, honey, all the work you did for him from Iowa.’ Beginning in Iowa to Ohio. We had to watch the thing in the hotel.

“What it said to me on a personal level,” he goes on, “was that brother Barack Obama had no sense of gratitude, no sense of loyalty, no sense of even courtesy, [no] sense of decency, just to say thank you. Is this the kind of manipulative, Machiavellian orientation we ought to get used to? That was on a personal level.”

But there was also the betrayal on the political and ideological level.

“It became very clear to me as the announcements were being made,” he says, “that this was going to be a newcomer, in many ways like Bill Clinton, who wanted to reassure the Establishment by bringing in persons they felt comfortable with and that we were really going to get someone who was using intermittent progressive populist language in order to justify a centrist, neoliberalist policy that we see in the opportunism of Bill Clinton. It was very much going to be a kind of black face of the DLC [Democratic Leadership Council].”

Obama and West’s last personal contact took place a year ago at a gathering of the Urban League when, he says, Obama “cussed me out.” Obama, after his address, which promoted his administration’s championing of charter schools, approached West, who was seated in the front row.

“He makes a bee line to me right after the talk, in front of everybody,” West says. “He just lets me have it. He says, ‘You ought to be ashamed of yourself, saying I’m not a progressive. Is that the best you can do? Who do you think you are?’ I smiled. I shook his hand. And a sister hollered in the back, ‘You can’t talk to professor West. That’s Dr. Cornel West. Who do you think you are?’ You can go to jail talking to the president like that. You got to watch yourself. I wanted to slap him on the side of his head.

TSA says it’s okay to grope little kids

Michael — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 19:33:06 +0000

After the video of a 6-year-old child being patted down before boarding a plane with her girls went viral, the TSA tried to say that it was the only way to ensure our safety.

Really? C'mon… I mean, really?

CNN shoots another pilot with Soledad O’Brien

Michael — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 17:55:10 +0000

Soledad O'Brien is great looking. Once she opens her mouth, she proves that she's about as dumb as a box of rocks.

On the other side of the coin, for some reason the network flacks at CNN fall down and worship the ground she walks on. I haven't figured out why. She comes across on the air about as flimsy as cheap toilet paper and with about as much depth.

Now, they're trying to give her a show of her own?

Just damn.

The Truth About Race, Religion, And The Honor Code At BYU

Michael — Thu, 14 Apr 2011 16:56:43 +0000

Deadspin has an interesting — albeit long — article about race and the honor code at Brigham Young University.

With the overall big have-to-do about basketball player Brandon Davies in the last weeks of the college basketball season, a light is finally being shown on BYU's honor code and its treatment of athletes (black ones in particular) at the Mormon school. Many say this points to a discriminatory message from BYU toward blacks, and while Mormons do have a history of not being like blacks (including a long-standing rumor that according to the Mormon faith, the first thing blacks do when they die is that they "turn white"), I think the issue is more one of those who are Mormons versus those who are not.

As a Mormon institution, BYU is going to focus on that faith, and anyone who is outside of that faith (i.e., most of the rest of us) is persona-non-grata. They want to keep to themselves. Let 'em.

Sumo wrestler becomes heaviest to finish marathon

Michael — Mon, 21 Mar 2011 23:46:57 +0000

I was thrilled with my 51:25 time for my 5K Saturday morning — after all, I had shaved more than three minutes from my previous best of 55:00 — which was three or four years ago – I haven’t done one since; at least until this week.I’m tickled pink overall. And I’m looking forward to doing the Sweetwater 5K next month over in Candler Park (and yes, you’re more than welcome to join me if you’re in town).

But this evening, I’ve run across the incredibly inspiring story of a 400 pound sumo wrestler in Los Angeles who, get this, completed the LA Marathon this weekend. He jogged the first 8 miles, and walked the rest of the way. He finished up in just shy of 10 hours — which shaved about 2 hours off his personal best.

To answer your question, no, I’m not ready to do a marathon…yet.

****************************
From KNBC Los Angeles:

Sumo Wrestler Sets "Heaviest" Marathon Record

Updated 7:07 AM PDT, Mon, Mar 21, 2011 |

Sumo wrestler Kelly Gneiting completed the L.A. Marathon in 9:48:42 to set a new Guinness World Record for the “heaviest person to complete a marathon”

Gneiting, 40, of Fort Defiance, Ariz., weighed in at Dodger Stadiumbefore the race at exactly 400 pounds and took off with the main field at 7:43 a.m. in cool, but dry conditions, crossing the start line several minutes later at the back of the 23,542-runner pack, according to race officials.

Rain began falling soon after he started, and he moved through the Stadium to the Sea course in increasingly rainy and extremely windy conditions.

He said that he lost track of where he was after mile 10 and, slightly delirious, only figured out that he’d made it to mile 15 when his friend and fellow sumo wrestler, Americus Abesamis, met him with fresh socks and told him how far he had come.

At that point, he said, “I was ecstatic.”

He walked the final 18-plus miles of the race after jogging through the first eight miles.

Because his pace was much slower than the 13-minutes-per-mile pace used to calculate street re-openings, he did the last half of the race on the sidewalk, while also obeying all traffic signals.

“The people of Los Angeles are amazing,” he said. “There was lots of honking and yelling, ‘Go, you’re almost there,’ by both marathoners and spectators. I was really struggling in the last five miles, but I said to myself, ‘if I have to crawl, I will.’”

Gneiting finished at 5:51 p.m. in a driving rain and high winds. His post-race weigh-in showed him — without shirt or shoes — at 396.2 pounds, well ahead of the old Guinness-recognized record of 275 pounds.

He was met by about 20 well-wishers and news media who braved the conditions to see him finish.

Noting that he cut more than two hours off his 2008 L.A. Marathon time of 11:52:11, he joked, “I’d like to see a Kenyan improve his marathon time by two hours.”

Gneiting has represented the United States for the last seven years at the World Sumo Championships or World Games.

Gneiting completed the 2008 marathon in 11 hours, 52 minutes, 11 seconds, but was not credited with the record because he did not follow the Guinness requirements that he be weighed immediately before and after the race, and that the entire race be filmed.