Don't Ever Give Me Time To Think About A Blogpost...

I'm still around.

I'm taking time to get out of boxes, learning to share this massive space with my other half (you should have a child or a mid-sized pet if you have anything over 2000 square feet like we have), making a transition out of the truck (yeah, that's happening) and learning to ride a motorcycle (somewhat, gas mileage is better) with my time back in Chicago.

My other half works in the burbs so adjustment to the city and learning the commute is her current assignment. I think the shear size of both the city and the new digs (hence named the compound) are a little intimidating. There is also a concern about the neighborhood. I grew up in this area (we relocated to the Bronzeville area on the south side of Chicago... Look that up. History, y'all) and I know it well. I also cut my teeth as a poet and musician gigging in places that are long gone. Some are still here, but exist in a different aspect.

The area has a rich tradition of black history and it's currently being gentrified. There are tons of young, black professionals and upper crust blue-collar folk that have flocked here and the change is very visible for me. My wife can't see that right now because in most gentrified areas there is what I like to call 'the nigger element'. It's sad that some folks aren't able to hold on during a transition such as this. Folk try hard to hold on to the old-school values of the hustle that just doesn't work when higher priced real estate, shops and entertainment venues hit a neighborhood. Some folks don't want to give into growth and economic development and shun the change which means in a few months to years they'll be priced out of the neighborhood.

I hate that, but I welcome it as well in some aspects. I have faith in my people to adapt, adjust and make the necessary changes to prosper.

The grime and crime of the big city exists everywhere, I just get tired of pointing that out to my wife. We need time to adjust, me to her adjusting and her to adjust to big city life. It's not hard but I do realize and recognize that she ain't from these here parts and I have to be an ambassador. I was fine with my commute to the Pacific Northwest, but we made a decision to be closer. To each other, to family and to, well... The city.

So we're here.

And because of that, I have to remove myself from the road, but it's cool. After I hang a couple of TVs on the wall and make sure we're wired for the matrix things should be settled. We have 2 living rooms to decorate (upstairs and down) and between furniture stores big and small and with the help of a few items from Ikea we should be comfy in a few days. Well at least at home we'll be, but it starts from there, right? I just need time to let the city grow on my other half, so for the time being, I will be a guide. I'm good at guiding.

Plus I like concerts, shows, sporting events and dining out and Chicago has plenty of that.

Advantage, Hassan.

Oh, and further more... We're working on adding additional residents to the home. All in due time though. No cryptic message here, so stop that. One thing at a time, okay?


_________________________________________________________________

I would like to say for the record that one reason that I haven't blogged is because I am a member of Trinity United Church of Christ. Of course I hear the cries of cultism, racism, hate spewing and other isms. I refuse to address this because (get ready) this is utter bullshit.

After reading literally thousands of comments on blogs, watching Fox, CNN, MSNBC, the Posts (New York, Washington and the like), AJC, and the Chicago papers as well as other countless electronic media thingamajigs I see that folks still believe everything they see and hear and are fed by both the left and the right.

I will not defend Jeremiah Wright because he is a grown man and only speaks for himself and not others. I will not disown, disavow or separate myself from him not because he was my pastor, but because I agree 100 percent with the things he said. I will not urge anyone to either read transcripts or watch entire videos because all we need is a 30 second sound byte in order to get true understanding of what anyone says, right?

Never have I seen anyone get questioned for something someone else said under the guise of free speech and/or freedom of religion. I as a black man am tired as hell of having to explain myself to white folk (I said it) in order to be validated as whole when my ancestors built this country off of free labor and never profited from it. I'm tired of these Uncle Tom house negroes getting on TV polarizing things unnecessarily. Funny how certain folks can question someones minister and not even question theirs. Or others.

From what I read and heard, we have a long way to go in race relations. A lot of non-black folk think that black folk are naturally inferior and that non-black folk have to set programs and regulate black folk's behavior in order for us to prosper. A lot of non-black folk think that ALL of our jobs and positions come via affirmative action and are angry that it gives us an advantage. A lot of non-black folk still think that we are a savage people and that they had to give us their god (Jesus included) in order to save us from our own destruction because we know no better.

A lot of non-black folk feel that we have to give up all that is our lineage and disavow Africa in order to not be threatened as Americans. A lot of non-black folk are afraid of Islam, even though Israel and Ismail makes them cousins, Jesus himself was a Jew and Christianity was established more than 400 years after Christ left Earth, whereas the descendants of the house of Ismail were already here reading the Qur'an. A lot of non-black folk that recently came to America in the last 100 years claim ignorance to slavery and wonder why we get angry over being made whole via transaction for all of that free labor when companies like JP Morgan/Chase only exist because of the bankable gazillions made over the years off of the backs of the slave and the Jim Crow regulated black person and they either blend right in or are accepted and can assume the old formulas of gaining wealth when it is hard to get the same deal for folks that have been here, struggling.


A lot of non-black folk think that we support and fund terrorism and never give thought to black folk being terrorized for 500 years via kidnapping, slavery, the KKK and other supremacist groups, Jim Crow, benign neglect, lack of funding of the school systems, separate but unequal, welfare and welfare reform, human control such as the Tuskegee Experiment, change of diet to European standards that cause Diabetes, cancers and the like, the imbalance of the criminal justice system and racial profiling, the theft of labor, music (such as Jazz and Hip Hop) and literature of folks of African descent, the banning of travel and trade to African nations, the support of Apartheid, giving reparations to folks of Jewish, Japanese and Vietnamese descent, the assassinations of King, El Shabazz, Evers, Newton, Hampton Jr. and so on, and building wealth through slave labor and passing it down to non-black families, fraternal orders and friends via stocks, corporations and trust funds as well as teaching hate, separatism and the general belief that we are an inferior people.

And I don't have a right to be hostile?

Black folk never brought up race... But some folks continue to do so.

How in the hell can someone kidnap us, expect us to grow up as a people in inferior conditions and then get mad at us because we're still here? How can white folks (not all, some) get angry and afraid when we speak of race and the issues we have being who we are? With all that America has done to the world via terrorism wouldn't it be expected that that hate be returned? That's why black folks weren't afraid after September 11th.

We are used to being terrorized!!!

If your family didn't own slaves... Rape and beat them... Give them inferior conditions to live and grow. Sell them off when their families expanded. Take advantage financially of slave labor and cheap labor of free black folk's labor... There is still guilt because those families still prospered in a society where it was law to do so. If our people didn't have a voice due to being chattel and not voting citizens how could we have benefited? The government was allowed to buy, sell and trade our ancestors as well and gained financially off of this. The government regulated the law and after abolishment changed laws only to have us still not be heard and relegated us to the back of the bus and so on. So the homes, cars and trust funds... The college educations, union positions and patronage on the job... The standards and practices that brought affirmative action to the workplace was all the advantage your folks had over us.

We can run in the race now but how can we win when non-black folks had the biggest head start known to man?

Today we no longer ask, we get in where we fit in, but that is still a hard thing to do when non-black folk are still eating off the backs of long dead slaves and we cannot get a crumb. So we make stuff up as we go along (like Jazz, Rock and Roll and Hip Hop) and excel at stuff that wasn't designed for us. We create influence through out style, rhythm and flair and try to hold onto it as long as we can, but things like the court systems and community policing skews our trust in the system. The lack of African-American history in mainstream American schools limits the minds of non-black folk and there is disbelief and mistrust (see: Barack Obama) in our capabilities. Patronage still exists. The non-black mindset is still being taught in rural America which means only one thing...

These things have had an effect and currently affect our people mentally, physically, spiritually, economically and obviously socially which means we need to talk... Post haste. We can help you understand. I am not afraid or guilty to talk about it, and neither should non-black America.

This cannot and will not be swept under the rug.

Ntimbanjayo Family Roadtrip Update:

Leg One - Friday Afternoon

Leg one of the Ntimbanjayo family road trip finds me at the airport, patiently waiting to get the hell out of the ignorant, shiftless, lazy-ass employee zone.

I swear I could smack the HR guy or gal who hires these folks.

ME: "Can I bring this unopened bottle of water and fruit cups thru the gate?"

THEY: (not looking in the bag or making eye contact) "No liquids past this point, if it's liquid, you can't get through here"

I guess if she would have looked in the bag and actually heard me...

Never mind. San Francisco is up next, and then I get on a plane so small I might get to fly it into Oregon. After my microbrews.

Oh, and don't think I'm sleeping on the goings on inside the Matrix...

Michigan and Florida actually disenfranchised voters a year ago...

Oh, and speaking of Michigan, did Kwame say 'nigger' at the State Of The D?

It's not that Hil is racist, I think not. A lot of folk believe that Barack is a phenomenon. The whole thing is a fluke to have made it this far. No one planned past super Tuesday, that's all. I don't think Geraldine meant any harm it's just some folk think that certain people will vote Democrat regardless of what that party had not done or who represents it.

They really think that this is a case study of a person of color making an impact by enunciating and actually generating interest via a viable platform. Like Shirley, Brother Gregory, Jesse and Rev. Al didn't have one regardless of personality. Some folks just can't believe that a brother can get that far... So this is the response.


Oh snap, time to board.

So far, no one is dead yet. I hope it stays that way. Once we get in the car, that is.

SEACREST, OUT

____________________________________________________________

LEG TWO : Saturday Morning

Finds us leaving Sacramento headed east on I-80 to Reno.

We got bigger hitch put on the truck, got the trailer hooked onto it and packed the whole house with the help of a moving company and filled said trailer all in about 3 and a half hours. We hot the road around 9:30 pm Central time and drug the trailer very slowly up and down I-5 thru great elevations, unhappy truck drivers and snow.

Someone was initially freaked out but I'e done this run in my rig before from Vancouver to Ontario California a few times so things were cool. We got from southern Oregon to Sac-town in under 5 hours and since I wasn't supposed to drive this leg but ended up doing it we took refuge in a name-brand hotel (never doing that again, trust me, next time we stay at the Bates Motel... at damn near a hundred bux? Sheeeeeyit. Gotta keep it cheap mane) and I got some much needed sleep.

Now comes the scenic route... CA to NV to the Sierra Nevadas into Salt Lake City. Old stomping grounds and lunch with an old friend and the kids.

So far, good times and good memories to boot.

________________________________________________________________

UPDATE - Wednesday, 3/11

We made it.

After driving to Sacramento to avoid storms and still getting caught in mountain based, foggy snow snafus... Seeing Reno and salivating all up and thru Lake Tahoe... driving thru Donner's Pass (elevation 8000+ feet) and seeing the clouds meet the mountains while driving over the Continental Divide (elevation OVER 10,000 feet)... Stopping in Salt Lake City and introducing my wife to old friends (we crashed at her spot, good looking out Jodi), laughing thru Cheyenne Wyoming and getting stuck for seven hours on 3 inches of ice on an entrance ramp (I did get good sleep while waiting for emergency services... Finding out that certain truck stops in Nebraska serve good non-Mexican made tacos and folks in Iowa drink plenty of green beer for St Paddy's... Introducing my wife to the world's largest truck stop and rolling thru Chicago morning traffic we made it to find out that the keys to our duplex didn't work. The place has three bathrooms and I was holding my pee all the way from friggin' Joliet...

Luckily we called our agent and he was on the scene in less than ten minutes.

I opened the doors, met the movers as they came to unpack our stuff and took my driving ass to bed.

2409 miles in 55 hours. 7 hours of sleep total. My wife didn't even have to touch the steering wheel. The truck could only tow 1000 pounds, the trailer and hitch with our stuff weighed over 2000. I slept most of the day yesterday. My boss wouldn't let me work.

I woke up yesterday afternoon to the news that I have a NEW truck.

The catch... I gotta drive to Olive Branch, Mississippi to get it.

That's why I got an extra day off... I get it now. So I'm back on the road. Chicago to Mississippi in under 8 hours today.

I am a driving ass.

I'm Building Me A Home... Never Mind, We Paid For It

Peace and blessings fam...


Yep, I've been busy working long hours in shorter timeframes in order to take a few days for my other half and I to embark on our third travel adventure. I'm calling this one:

The Ntimbanjayo Family Road Trip - Volume One

That's right shawty... We're driving 2500-plus miles from southern Oregon to the Chi..

We got a home here so it's time to travel east and settle this house.


Have a great weekend and pray for safety. Pics and video to come when we get home.

Don't Be A Sucker... Sucker!

You're being duped.

You'll be disappointed soon.

Time to leave all of those with personal interests alone and just go out on your own.

It has to happen.

Stop living a lie.

Fighting The Urge... Living The Fight

I don't think I made that last post to make people feel for me or to testify, I was having what I like to call a writing flashback. In my mind, I was comparing then to now.

For me right now, now really feels like then.

I remember how things felt as I was at the cusp of change. I had seasoned myself with those habits I described and even though I knew some of them would take more than others so I pushed on.

In that inception of my life I let bad habit and me falling into the status quo point me in a direction I had problems turning out of. Things feel the same now and I have a strong urge to drink but I haven't and don't plan to.

I look at my wife and look at our moves, stand back and look at the incredible responsibility I have every time I drive eighty thousand pounds and I'm baffled at how numb I am at just doing things. In the past few years I've transformed myself from a single, cubicle dwelling employee living in an oversized suburban condo to whatever I am now. I gave up the condo, sold my just bought car and gave away all of my belongings to go to Utah. When I got there all I had was an army duffel bag full of stuff, a few thousand dollars that I paid to go to trucking school and three people that I spoke to daily to keep me grounded and focused.

In a few months I was driving a truck and actually leased one of those large machines and was driving cross country until I got injured. My lease ended and I went back to Chicago.

Just like that, I was back at square one but things were different. I had no money, no place to stay and no job. It took my sister and brother, my cousin, my ex and a few new found friends to help get me back on track and in that time I hadn't taken a drink to help numb the pain until I got to Houston. The last month and a half there last year found me drinking the equivalent of a six pack a day to numb what I felt was a dire situation for me.

I went to Houston with good intentions and felt like I was duped by those who were helping me. Communication was bad and I had put my tail between my legs and ended back in cubicle land. It was expected of me to do this even though I wanted to get back out on the road and be free. I wanted to be my own boss again. Having that taste of living on my own terms was too much like right and I made bad decisions in where I landed after my injuries and trusted the wrong people so I corrected that, got free and ended up in Chicago once again.

The one person I thought I'd never get a chance to hold court with I married Christmas eve last year. We have known each other since 2005 and I continued to go places and chose to be with people that would have the two of us in different places. I've always known it would be a whole lot to handle fs we were to ever get our lives synced so I never had the idea to pursue her until I got to Chicago last summer. She was one of the folks I kept in contact with as a close friend but I never thought it would be her I would be planning a family with.

But I am.

And knowing of the whole that makes who she is and what she wants... Knowing her plans and dreams and knowing she's planning her life around me makes me feel like I'm cheating her sometimes. I don't know if what I'll do will ever be enough for her and that puts me in a place emotionally i've never been.

I believe if I wasn't responsible for that hundred thousand dollar piece of machinery I'm looking at parked outside my window...

If I didn't care about the folks I drive around all day every day...

If I didn't love to be in the presence of my other half...

If my pay was similar to what I used to earn back in the day...

If I didn't have this opportunity to be my own boss, setting my own hours to have the time to spend with myself out there under just the sun and clouds working on mastering my mind and spirit...

If we weren't planning a family and the ones I call friend didn't give a damn to check in every now and then...

I would be drinking again in heavy quantities. There are times that I wish that I could ingest just enough alcohol to make the pain of progress and the lack of understanding my emotions and the scope of things to come just go away. There are times that I wish I was just numb and non-existent. I would probably add some sort of narcotic to it so I could not be myself. I've opened myself up to so many that have taken advantage in so many situations that required me to be beyond who I am and exposed myself to a few that had ulterior motives just to take a piece of my soul that in some instances when I needed to dig a little deeper and pull a piece of me out to blanket a life situation I thought I can handle it either wasn't there or it was damaged to the point where I had to fake it in order to make it which damaged me ever more.

It's hard to try to cover life situations being damaged goods but there is literally no place to run.

I cannot tell you how I continue to move forward, so I look back to tell myself. It's just sometimes I give y'all a glimpse of who Hassan was before he was Hassan by blogging about it. It hasn't been pretty. I guess me wanting to have a better life and live out the entire story outweighs my desire to be drunk. I'm glad of that. If I were to give in to those urges I wouldn't have anything, and that is one option I absolutely cannot have.

I hate yesterday... Sometimes it feels like today

I remember the first time I was aware of who I was...

It was November 1992 and I had just gotten out of the Army. I was in San Francisco because I had exited the military while stationed in Korea so Uncle Sam sent me to the Presidio to be debriefed and for out processing. That took a little time and I also knew that there was not much that could have been debriefed (my opinion) so I took a lump sum for taking the early out option and enjoyed my stay out on the left coast.

I liked Oakland better, it was like being back in Chicago in the 80's.

During my last week in Korea I was retrieving the mail for the batallion staff. My position as personnel security chief hadn't been filled. I had an office right down the hall from the full bird colonel that ran our four company batallion and for the most part I was seen and not heard processing security clearances and issuing COMSEC (COMmunications SECurity devices that recorded radio transmissions made out of carbon. They could be destroyed with water if the enemy approached. We recorded everything and kept the transmissions in a safe, and I was in charge of that as well as newly drawn maps of the Northern part of the Korean peninsula via spy satellites... Sigh, the life.) to the goofies that had no clue to what we were doing on the 26th parallel.

I found a piece of mail meant for someone that had went back to the states from DeVry so I opened it and thought hard about what I would and could do now that I was getting out. I imagined going to this three year institution and getting my degree and getting a wholesome and good job. I saw myself as a homeowner, a husband and a father having little discomfort. I linked all good thoughts to getting into this technical institute and doing well. I never gave thought to struggling when I got home.

Until I walked away from and off of Presidio's hallowed halls and base and entered San Fran and Oakland to go and play.

I had a few thousand in my pocket and Uncle Sam had given me more for unused vacation and for taking the early out. Funny how as soon as I got to the base and gave them my exit paperwork to process I got a check first before anything else. Back then, out processing the military took weeks and was a long arduous task. One had to take classes and be counseled in order to reacclimate to normal society. If someone like myself had access to anything to a secretive nature, they were debriefed. I don't want to go into explaining that process.

I like how my mother told my wife last year about the 'gaps' in my service. Yeah, even my mom knows (and Terry does too) about service gaps for certain military personnel.

The first thing I experienced as a member of the free world I helped to protect and defend was a fight from a bunch of cats that had no respect for military people. I later drank with them after they saw me wild out. This was my initial counseling and reacclimation to the world. All I wanted was a drink. So what that I had the haircut and the body type of one of those army dudes? We had just finished up a war and to a few folk at this one particular spot, I was the cause of most of the bullshit George HW Bush and Dick Cheney (who was Army chief of staff at that time) pushed to the American people. And for that I was not accepted.

I had never been rejected in public like that before but remember, we ended up having that drink.

Alcohol had never tasted like that to me before. It seemed to fill some emotional void. It spoke to me when everyone else looked at me with disdain and contempt. It became my security blanket. I had already developed a drinking problem overseas, drinking damn near a half gallon of hard liquor and maybe seven to ten beers a night during my last few months in Korea, but that was what we usually did over there anyway. I had no clue my tolerance was so high when I got back to the states. I kept drinking... All the way back to Chicago.

By the time I enrolled for school I had failed a few drug tests because when I got back to the south side, all of the cats I left there in the 80's from high school were still there, and they were smoking blunts and killing malt liquor. The time I spent in San Francisco was almost like a proving ground. Being in Oakland with a bunch of deadbeat cats that was always at the club helped me enhance my social skills through drinking. I was still in military mode, so weed smoking was out of the question.

Until I got home.

There were no jobs and no love for an unskilled black man in Chicago. There was no pride in serving one's country on the south and west sides. I was a sucker for getting my college money by joining the army and according to many, I was just a pawn. My mother has convinced me to come and live with her so I could give her my entire paycheck and watch my little brother and sister because my dad had left right as I joined the military, and there wasn't any room for me, but that didn't matter. I was just a babysitter in her eyes. One that got a GI Bill check she could spend for herself, damn me.

I slept on the couch and all of my belongings were in a locked closet still packed up for damn near a year until I had enough of that bullshit and broke out of there.

In that time I enrolled at DeVry and tried to stay focused but it was hard. All that time spent in Japan, Korea and other places for years shielded me from the booty, and I had to chase it at all costs, even though I had a girlfriend. I ended up getting a job with the phone company and was earning at least $60k in the early 90's which made me hood rich, so I rented my best friends mother's basement which gave up a place to smoke, drink and party. And that's all I did.

Something was telling me that I would never make it out of the neighborhood so celebrate as much as I can before I die.

And I did.

At the end of 1993 I was downing a twelve pack of Red Bull (the malt liquor, energy drinks did not exist), a half a pack of Newports and smoked at least 2 blunts before I would go to class. After I got the job with the phone company, I switch over to night and weekend classes and eventually stopped going because I would wait until I got off work to smoke and drink. I can't remember much of what happened those nights, I just knew that I worked for AT&T for about two years before I stopped coming to work because I was too embarrassed that I smelled like either weed smoke and/or liquor.

I got fired due to no-call/no-show. And then I got put out of the apartment when my friends mother found out I had no job.

I had a devoted girlfriend
A family
A few friends that gave a damn
A working musical relationship with a close friend... And we were recording
Add a degree in the making

And I let all of that go because I needed to stay in this 'mode'.

Alcohol made me forget and weed made time pass by. I had gained more than 250 pounds in a few years. I was also homeless and had burned a whole lot of bridges.

It was 1996 and I was damn near 400 pounds with a weed habit. I was living out of my van and couldn't find a job to save my life. I was gigging lightly with a band (if free beer counts as pay) and I was thinking about getting back into school... Something happened.

God spoke to me.

Oh don't get it twisted, I didn't get saved or anything like that. I stopped smoking weed but I kept on drinking. Right up until that whole diabetic coma episode.

That was 1998.

I was arrogant, evil and had no respect for my own life. I remember those times and I cannot erase the inate details I will never type onto these pages. I live with that and am in shear amazement that I am where I am now. There is so much more to that time in my life. There is so much I wish I never experienced but I can't turn back the hands of time. All I have is now, and now is as good as it has ever been. But it still feels like I'm climbing out of something.

I hate what I did with life back then. But sometimes those memories come back and I wish...

Never mind.

You'd like to think you're stronger now. I hope you are. I don't know if I am.

Never Again

Sometimes I quietly admonish myself when I'm rendered helpless on things.

That happened to me yesterday.

As much as I trust the one person I feel I can ever trust with everything, I also feel like I should be able to protect my wife from anything and everything with no exception. There was a business situation in which there was an error made and I could do nothing.

I felt like dying because two months into my marriage I was remanded to just standing there being rendered useless in a situation and I felt less than myself. And to top it off it was my anniversary. Dig that.

Now I know as a man there is a point where he is to leave his woman enough space for her to do her thing, I guess I haven't found the point where I'm supposed to give space.

All I could ever want in a woman lies next to me at night, and last night I just couldn't sleep right because I felt like I should have done something to save the situation, so all I could do in lying in bed was to try to find the perfect position. We writhed and wiggled and never found that perfect point. She started snoring and I pulled her close making her skin my skin. I tried my best to find the right touch, the proper stroke to soothe and settle my better half and provide enough comfort for her to find that perfect place in sleep so she could lose her troubles, but to no avail.

We both woke up this morning sore and fatigued.

As hard as I tried to rub her shoulders and caress her neck, pull her close to find that perfect spooning position, wrap myself onto her and vice versa things just didn't work out. And now I feel like I owe her more than I did yesterday.

I got up at about 2:45 in the morning went over to D Herbs and made the decision to take the total body fast and the pancreatic fast seeing as I'm supposedly diabetic, I need to purge my failures and be healthy enough to be her to raise my family and be there for her. That's all that matters, right? We made a decision in December to get a sleep number bed, and that is being purchased first as we fill our new home in a week or two. There is no way she can wake up uncomfortable again. I need to make sure her GPS and satellite radio in her vehicle works perfectly so she can never feel lost alone in this, the third largest city in the world. I still think it's unfair that I lived here first. I hate having unfair advantages over her like that. I need an even keel. I need to make sure she continues to never hear a lie from my mouth and every action directed towards her is geared for comfort and ease, I can never fail this woman. She will bear my seeds and command my home and she deserves better than what I'm doing/giving right now..

I need to do more.
I need to be more.
I need to have more.
I need to make more.

My world no longer feels big, important or just enough enough to have her in it. I'm not overwhelmed, I just need to be the man that she married and I feel that situations like yesterday slips me down a notch where I once stood, unable to do anything.

I never experienced that before. I never need to fail her or myself like that ever again. It cuts like a knife and digs in like a shovel... And it hurts, yet it's so simple.

Damn.

Snow Day

Okay, I'm snowed in somewhere near the Iowa/Illinois border.

When I get a chance... I'll blog about something.

Tuesday... Wisconsin just ain't Madison, Milwaukee and Green Bay either!

Van Glorious!

Still protected by the red, the black and the green with a key...

It's funny how you think that sometimes you're not ready for things. I really thought that I didn't want marriage because I tried so hard at various times in my life to be by myself. I mean really by myself with no one to turn to because I felt that although I wasn't in control of things that surround my life force that I had to have total control of what I could and I damn sure dismissed everyone and every thing that attempted to try to share in my shine.

I didn't hate people, I just didn't like outsiders with agendas trying to come in and assume a role that I never gave from my heart.

As I grow old (not 'older' like proper grammar and context would normally dictate) I become aware of the value of time. I know that a lot of things I've ingested literally and figuratively will most likely shorten my life no matter how much fasting (for the body/life force) and learning (for the life living/lived) I do a lot of damage has been done and I've lived longer than I actually have left to live, and I'm cool with that. What I'm totally not cool with one bit is where, who and how I used to spend my time. I now have to micro manage that shit. I eluded yesterday to how at various points in my life I was undervalued, underestimated and marginalized by folks that were supposedly close to me and by the situations I put myself in. Note that I take responsibility for said situations and being around folks that could care less for you and yours.

Now yes, I'm selfish and picky. Of course I look out for self most of the time and that came from experiencing other folks' selfishness and me gaging how selfish I needed to be in order to counter. I don't figure to be talented that much but there are those that will be in your presence only to bask in your shine and will take that hue and create their own after market version to have for themselves. Some people will hang onto you like folks listen to Obama speeches thinking that one man's idea of hope is just good enough to be nourished with and will never act on the hope of hope. Just the sound of the voice giving the speech is enough for one to be drousy and the thoughts of what could be is the elixir that actually puts them in dream land. Too bad one day they wake up old and unfulfilled.

Some folks thrust you into Oprah status, living vicariously through you ingesting your adventures as their own, leaving you on the porch waiting to tell another life event that is now reserved for dinner table theater. I've been some of these things to some people and then I noticed that I was just a thing to most, a talking, writing object to others and they never got a chance to really know me, never really knowing what makes me tick.

And then I met the woman I married (now years ago) and the one thing I noticed from the start (all the way back in 2006) that she was picking me apart, not wanting to get a piece just yet but carefully inspecting the pieces of who I was and carefully adding them to her lists of things she could tolerate, things she liked/disliked and the such just to see if she could apply them to her life. And she did this with respect. Respect to me as a person and to our situations and I liked that. She always dealt with me evenly in an emotional sense and that helped us become closer because she still had her own things going on relationship wise, allowing me to continue on my track in being Hassan, whoever he is.

Out of time spent, trials had and conversation spoken came trust, and we still had other things going on in our lives. Although we dated other people, performed other tasks and existed in other spaces the time I spent getting to know her as she did me was damn near storybook with the exception of the bullshit that was happening in our respective individual spaces. So based on what I demanded in my life I made the first move and ejected myself from my personal turmoil and found a quiet place for my mind back home. All the folks that I thought were responsible for helping me make my mind's noise from the beginning assisted me in getting to that quiet place.

And when I got home, she was there, gathering her parachute. It seemed like there was an undue influence causing her to hit the eject button as well.

And then we started spending time.
Buying plane tickets
Living off of Priceline.com
Weekends
Time became life
Weekdays
down time off the truck
Holidays
Family
Internet hate
Friends
Revelations
discussions of babies
Las Vegas

And after Vegas came the realization that I married the one person I could absolutely trust and who could possibly just be my best friend. All of that other stuf that made me not trust the good common folk of the planet disappeared.

What?

Is that why I don't put poetry on the blog anymore?

First the Fat Boys break up, now this: Hassan might just be happy, satiated even.

Imagine that.

More tomorrow.

Monday...

Man oh Manischewitz..

What weekend that was had. I'm back on the road and when I stop in Des Moines I'll tell you (somewhat) about it.

One thing: This weekend's Chris Rock show featured hip hop icons Whodini.

Damn.

That's right. A lot of folks didn't even know what was going on at the show (meaning a lot of folks who bought a ticket had no clue who Whodini was... Imagine that!) but somebody kept it really real with their material. Not even a few truthfighters could keep up with Chris.

But there was much more that happened in and around Chicago with the wife and I, and when I get a chance...

Oh, and never, never, never, ever, ever, EVER let anyone undervalue, underestimate or marginalize you.

I was at one point in my past very recently and in various situations in my life and I vow with all of my breath to never let that happen to me again. Anyone who comes against me and mine like that is worthy of death. I urge you to look at your situation and your life and do whatever it takes to not let it happen to you.

You'll be able to breathe and sleep when that happens.

Bounce...

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that other people won't feel insecure around you. We are all meant to shine, as children do. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in everyone. And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others."

Marianne Williamson

I want you to understand that the reason we are in this state of flux is because we are consumers and not producers, and not in a Puffy - DJ Premier sense. The reason we have nothing where we lay our heads is because we spend time putting our hard earned dollar right back into folks that take from us and never give back while other groups of people bounce their dollars many times amongst themselves before it leaves their community.

Asians, Arabs, Hispanics, Jews and whites in the United States generally spend money among themselves, "bouncing" dollars an average of six to 18 times before the money leaves the communities.

"The black dollar does not bounce, not one time in America." The only way to eradicate these problems in the black community is to help these people do what everyone else does."

Dr. Claud Anderson gave that quote. The theory of bouncing dollars has been on my mind ever since I've been reviewing transcripts of debates on both the republican and democrat candidates. One thing no one wants to talk about or take time in solving is the how and when we will ever sit at the table and attempt to come with a solution for people of African descent.

Understand that there have been bills passed into law giving other so-called minorities the rights and encumbrances fought for so that folks of African lineage could have equal opportunities. Also understand that every other so-called minority group has succeeded in creating a community in this country and black folk have not.

The initial launch of programs, bills and laws created and fought for back in the day was done to give ancestors of slaves financial equality, but so much has happened to take away that equalization through intimidation, death and all things of such an evil nature unleashed on my people that today we are only taught to purchase and consume and not to save, be conservative and make opportunity for our children through investment and production.

If former slaves got a hold of 40 acres, a mule and one hundred dollars it would be smart to assume that land would have been purchased, business stated and crops would have been harvested that would have given brown-skinned folks equity in this country. Things would have been so different.

• Schools would have materials to enhance the learning experience

• Families would have stayed together, seeing as the hustle would have not been so prevelent

• Ownership, investment and real material would have balanced opportunities for former slaves

I know I'm on a soapbox but know that I tire living in a world where people that look like me can't even pool a few dollars and get right. Latin folk bounce their dollars in their own hood 12 times before it leaves the hood. Asians... 16 times. We are the only people on the planet that have to make some sort of concession, whether it be beliefs, political affiliation or morals to others in order to be accepted and to this day, we still aren't. And the acceptance of Barack Obama by voters where there are no black people means nothing to me. Hell, everyone wants change, and Senator Obama through his candidacy and me living in his district witnessing this proves to me that he can offer such change.

When will my people have enough of a collective conscious to represent themselves as a whole people in American society? We have different views and beliefs but still feel the need to pander to others for acceptance and inclusion and we have no lobby where others do. And that is all based on the fight my ancestors made and we no longer benefit. Our people will fall into fourth class status if we don't come together and fight.

That makes me tired. I really want to move to Canada sometimes but... I don't know if Zesty and em' are ready for me. Plus I do like to fight.


Oh, and in other news... On this day 18 years ago... I got kitchen duty and was put on barracks restriction for two weeks for sneaking out of charge of quarters duty to see Mike Tyson get knocked the eff out by Buster Douglas in Japan. I had the time of my life going AWOL and sneaking off the base, but I did get caught by my platoon seargent on my way back to the base. It seems that we like the same sports bars and strip clubs when it comes to watching big money prize fights.

Damn, I'm old.

Seems like yesterday.

I didn't feel undervalued, underestimated or marginalized back then.

Ramble Young Man, Ramble...

You know, I'm getting a kick out of being away from the blog. My time has never been this occupied, and not how you think.

Marriage definitely has its challenges but I'm up to it. As much as I travel in and outside of my job catching up and making time for each other is a challenge and an adventure all in itself. We did get a chance to spend a few days in Oklahoma with the fam and that was cool in itself. We need to get a day planner in order to get time in to see everyone. I think my other half ended up a little disappointed because she didn't get to see a few folks, but we go back very soon. We're planning an event there and we gotta oversee the happenings and goings on.

I've actually been busy mining the deep recesses of my mind on a few creative projects and also making faces at the tv and monitors trying to understand my people, and then I stopped.

Why did my other half's grandmother ask if we were really married like we've been keeping this up at this marathon pace?

Nah, I'm still working on those creative things, I have given up attempting to understand the lost tribe of Shabazz. Whatever.

I have a lot of residual hate in my heart that I cannot rid myself of. At one point in my past I wanted to harm someone for putting me back under the government's (nee IRS) watchful eye. I struggled in my job last year because I couldn't get the security clearance needed to be in certain places which affected my job status and my paycheck. Shortly before the new year, I shook off the report my employer had on me from folk that I actually used for character references and got my clearance and now things are running much smoother seeing as I opted to be a 1099 cat which means they could make me disappear and hire someone direct in my place. I earned their trust, didn't create any incidents or have any accidents and or create moments that would cause them to deny me access to federal properties and databases like this person said I would do. And I got a raise in contractor pay. And a safety bonus. Kind of makes up for last year I guess, but I still wanna hurt folks every now and then because of that. I thank my brother and best friend from stopping me from doing dumb shit. I wouldn't be here now...

Having money don't mean a thing if I can be where I want to be, and that's home. I keep going there but being based out of Chicago (still) means I gotta get off the couch and go to the airport to drive my rig out of the midwest when I live out west. That sucks because contact and conversation ain't the same y'all and that causes tension both emotional and sexual.

Imagine what home time for me is like...

Yep.

And then we forget to take care of the business of bills and such that we had to play catch up with faxing, signing and taking care of stuff that needed to be paid to keep the partnership manageable. We gotta merge the cell phone/home phone/internet/wireless card thing to the point where one person gets our money.

Oh, and cordless phones are getting shittier...

My dad needs a new stint put in and now he's acting all old and needy. Dude is 58 and has a 36 year old wife. Once he gets re-wired, I'm telling him about himself and then siccing my peer of a step-mom on his ass. That should calm him down and get him back to normal. I cant have my pops acting like Grandpa Simpson all willy-nilly.

I haven't forgotten about the 'Hassan Nigger Wake-Up Call' posts. Just because I've been busy doesn't mean that I won't challenge you and provoke thought about our current status and our place right here, right now. I've noticed listening to radio talk shows, television and from last Tuesday that we collectively are one big mass of uninformed, mis-educated folk hellbent on being the first generation of black folk that won't leave anything for the next. To me, that is considered inappropriate behavior and next week I'll drop a few gems and ask a few questions that I feel need to be asked. I cannot be the only cat out there with so much in front of me and no one else notices that info, opportunity and freedom exists.

If Hillary cannot manage campaign funds and we're living in a deficit...
If the gub'ment raises conventional loan maxes to over 700k...
If illegal immigrants cannot vote then why is Barack pandering licences...
If congress is interrogating Roger Clements and the New England Patriots then who's...
Who has time to compose a 6 page email (and then who has time to re-edit it) and send it to hundreds of CHURCHFOLK outing men they think are gay (including children)...
If Vick got 23 months, the Jena cats almost got 15 then how did them WV kids get 10...


Whatever man... I'm rambling about nothing I guess

Yes We Can...

If you don't think we can then just sit and watch.

I don't care if you get a chance to get two votes in for Mitt Romney, get that ass up tomorrow and let your voice be heard.

It does matter.

Other than that, you have no reason to complain.

Okay, I'm Up...

I really don't have much to say.

There are a lot of things going on right up under your nose. No need to travel or go abroad to find problems, they're right here. I'm sure you either commute or drive right by something that irks the shit outta you. Try to fix that, I'll come back and complain when my utopia bubble bursts soon.

Probably wont. Why?

Things are comfortable and easy for me right now. I am happy right at this moment. I haven't been this content in more than a year and a half and I'm enjoying how things are going down. That takes away from my desire to blog. In my mind, ain't nothing much to say, with all of the shucking and jiving going on from Detroit to California I'm sure you have enough entertainment.


Don't worry bout' me.

Find something to get into this Black History Month, I'll be around, doing stuff.

Oh hell naw... Wait.

In the words of Joe Madison: Never let anyone undervalue, underestimate or marginalize you.

If this is the first day of Black History Month, then it is my duty to give you your nigger wake up call.

Now I don't know exactly what is going on in your hood, but as much as I travel and keep up on things I'm seeing a pattern:

you are comfortable, and you think they don't give a damn, but they do

They're going to let you sit and gain nothing while you become a third class citizen. Since the beginning of the slave trade, this nation was set up for folks that do not look like you to prosper off of your back and for the most part, it has worked. Wealth from the sweat of slaves to the ignorant that consume very unnecessary items in the spirit of keeping it real has us for the most part struggling just to get by in America today.

From the damn near 800 billion dollars we spend all the way down to how you are perceived in this current political climate, no one takes you seriously, and why should they? Just because things seem easier as you sit in your cubicle with all of this wonderful technology think about this: Black folk in America would be the 9th largest nation based on their populous, education and money spent if they were actually a community.

That's right I said it, we are not a community.

The reason our unemployment is high, income is lower and crime is rampant is because we have never banned together as a community. Don't blame illegal immigrants from south of the border for taking our jobs... Corporate America would have never lowered the wage standard and gave folks cheap labor positions if there were precedent set. And most of that work is unskilled labor that black folk didn't want in the first place because most folks thought that working with one's hands were beneath them.

How if our unemployment rate has been the same for damn near 20 years have immigrants came to compete with and now have surpassed us as second class citizens in the eyes of those with the big money?

We have been conditioned to fail and most of us get comfortable in that failure.

A portion of that whole Willie Lynch Syndrome was for black folk to be conditioned to protect the interest of the powers that be, rat out those that threaten said powers and be willing to adapt to the power's standards, which was foreign to their own. From speaking the language to worship to relaxing one's hair, we seem to aspire to be like them in so many ways that we have forgotten how to be ourselves. That's why it's so easy for a lot of us to Tom out on other black folks like what you see on cable news these days. I don' t have to agree with you and I can support someone else, that doesn't give you the right to clown me in front of the others.

See, we have no community.

Think about the Mexican immigrant that the damn near guaranteed work promised when he or she crosses the border. Think about the network that gets them here and houses them. Think about the individuals planted and blatantly hired by the big companies that get them to the factories and farms and such. Think about the banks and financial institutions that hold this money for future use. Think about the neighborhoods, the shops, stores boutiques and bodegas where that money is spent and how it circulates just within that community. Think about how an American bank only sees that money when real property or business finance is sought.

Now think about your hood.

If you are black and have a little cheddar, think about the integrated villages in which you live. If you are still struggling, think about the hood. Now look at all of the Chinese and Mexican restaurants, the Greek gyros spots, the Sikh and Middle Eastern owned spots and then ask yourself where they go home to when they close up.

Korea-town
Chinatown
Greek Town
Little Italy
Little Mexico

You get the point. Viable, thriving communities where their dollar circulates, folks have each other's backs and all consumerism for the most part begins and ends there. There are doctors, lawyers and insurance agents that hook them up. Everything they need from schools to daycare is all in that community. And the kicker... They keep the secrets locked up by using their native language and there is pride and inclusiveness in being who they are.

They come tired and poor, ban together, feed each other and fix them up, house one another and keep the money right there with all of the rest speaking their secret code language that we cannot decipher. They are not competing with us, they have moved right past us and you just lay there, watching and wondering.

Now ask yourself where the soul food joint is in their neighborhood? Why isn't there a black nail or barber shop over there but there is one of theirs all up and through yours.

Because black folk either leave for a mixed income spot to get away from the noise and crime of the neighborhood or stay 'trapped' in the hood .

Us = neighborhood
Them = community

And now more than ever we are more separate. From each other.

You as a so-called African American have been underestimated, undervalued and marginalized by everyone else and you are comfortable in selling out your culture. By not bringing the dollar home and partaking in starting and/or supporting our own business, by not owning real estate, by perpetrating violence and hatred against one another through hip hop and not embracing the tools industrial, agricultural, financial or educational we embrace racism inadvertently and institutionalized.

By not establishing an identity, embracing communal living and industry and not recycling our dollars with our own we well never have a community. By not embracing our cousins in Africa and adapting a sense of ethnic pride and continuing to buffoon for the benefit of others, even if one is clocking mad, doo doo dollars not bring that money home sells them to the highest bidder.

We'll never learn from Black History Month. We haven't. I heard a kid on a radio call in show last week telling the listeners that all he ever knew of Martin King was what he read in a book and it was about two paragraphs long. He had his masters. He wanted to state that him along with others are tired of hearing about this 'King guy' and really didn't know why he was held on a pedestal. He cited Barack Obama as a 'real hero' and mentioned that we need to see the world for what it is today instead of living in this vacuum from 40 years ago. In a sense he is right, but he is oh so wrong. We need to get with the program in the present and make change based on today. I was glad his bubble got burst when the talk show host informed him that his hero in Senator Obama presidential candidate, brown skinned, educated and born to lead is a manifestation of Dr. King's dream and wouldn't even be here if it wasn't for work put in back in the day.

We got barely a month to learn about the accomplishments and achievements of those that did what they could to make change and help us advance. What will you take from these next 4 and a half weeks to help play our part?

Or will you continue to be comfortable being undervalued, underestimated and marginalized?

Dear Democrats, Burn In Hell...

I'm calling Howard Dean out.

As chairman of the Democratic National Party, it should be YOU that acts as an adult in your party and not John Edwards.

I'm also calling Harold E. Ford Jr. out.

If you don't know who he is, he is the chair of the Democratic Leadership Council. No way on my watch, seeing as Bill and Hillary (yes, in that order) are members of said council would I let that BS happen like it did Monday night.

To give the Republican Party audio and video clips to use against the Democratic nominee this fall is ludicrous. To have members of the party quipping at each other about personal issues and not laying out an agenda is utter bullshit. To have them do it in front of the world is unacceptable. Some young leader you turned out to be.

These two gentlemen (and I use that term loosely) are AWOL.

I also an officially ashamed of the Congressional Black Caucus.

In 2000, there was a democratic debate at the Apollo theater that had Bernard Shaw as host and moderator and all of the questions came from the audience. Real questions about real issues, not that nonsense that was asked Monday night. It is unnecessary to say who those people were. Thanks for sponsoring a total waste of my time. Thanks for letting CNN ask all of the 'hard' questions (Clinton, a black president? Negroes please!). Thanks for not pushing for a single brown journalist to be on the panel.

You people are dead to me.

I also want to thank William Jefferson Clinton who I am assigning the title 'Modern Day Willie Lynch' for snoozing on Martin III at Ebinezer Baptist. I would also like to remind you that you cannot have a third term, so take a break and let your wife, the candidate come on talk shows and defend her position.

You also thought that since Barack dips in and out of black America on this talk show and that one, reminding us that he's black enough but has to get other votes as well that you could draw out his niggerdom membership card by making this thing personal. If he keeps having to defend himself he will never get to unravel his agenda as well as showing his 'black hand side' in getting indignant, thus making him a 'black candidate'. Americans want an agent for change, not a 'black candidate' and you know that. By making Barack defend his blackness, you push him against all them young, white folk that can barely relate pushing them independent and taking them away from Barack's, confusing their vote.

Smart.

Also tell your wife to mask her hateful eye contact and body language better. The fact that a black man is in the way of your wife's supposed birthright does not give you or her license to act like high school sophomores. I thought you were better than that.

Shame on you John Edwards.

You told Hillary and Barack that because she is a woman and because he is black they have no chance in rual America to gain enough trust to get votes seeing as you're the right white man for the job. So much for change in America, huh?

I still haven't decided to cast my vote but I can bet you one thing, if Hillary gets the nomination a Republican will hold the White House. If Barack gets the nomination, it will be a nasty general election where America will choose sides. If Edwards gets it, he becomes slicker than Slick Willie ever was.

Welcome to Decision 08'. Slimier than ever, and no one is taking responsibility for anything.

Lord help us.

Oh, and one more thing...

To use the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s name, likeness, dream or spirit in partisan politics should be damning in the eyes of God.

That's right, God damn you all for doing such a thing.

He lived a life of service to the community... For all of us and was murdered for what he thought of, accomplished and was fighting to accomplish. To even go near the political arena and use him to further your own acquisition for power should damn you to hell. Some of you are habitual line steppers and need to get checked post haste. There are better and more effective ways to politic to the people. Learn from the old school and get your act together dammit.

Some of us will not let this fly, I am one of them. You need MY vote to get there and I ain't no whore. No political party will pimp me or my people and shuck and jive on a world stage just to get a seat in the oval office.

Grown folks should act like grown ups. I'm starting to hate all of you.

Weekend Homework Assignment #617

Okay, More like 17...

Looking at my logs in the past week and some change I've been to Chicago, Cincinnati, Lima and Columbus, OH, Indianapolis, Hebron and Bloomington, IN, Detroit, MI, San Francisco, CA, Medford and Portland Oregon and Green Bay WI.

I forgot French Lick, IN (niiice casino), Louisville and Lexington, KY. Warmer weather and good food does that to ya.

I am tired, but I cannot stop. The movement moves on and so will I. With memory foam insoles.

Tomorrow I head to one of my favorite spots in the world, Atlanta, GA to rep the Chicago contingent, bump heads with the FTP Movement, press the flesh with the ATL brothers and sisters of the Hip Hop Caucus, hear the wisdom of Various members of the SCLC, attend the Sunday premier of Brave New Films' newest documentary in the 'The War On Greed' series and get down and dirty on its subject matter with various pundits and brown bloggers. I will close my nationally celebrated holiday out Monday at the King center paying tribute to a man and his wife who gave their lives so that I have the freedom to do exactly what I do. Travel, politic and blog about it.

I am truly honored and blessed that I do what I do. I am also thankful to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. , his wife Coretta, his sons and daughters and others for fighting and continuing to fight. I am also thankful to my wife for letting me roam the earth like Kane from Kung-Fu. Get your shoes woman... Next time you come with and see for yourself.

I planned on getting deep with the subject of non-urban dictates and how you spend your money but that can wait until next week. When Nichole Wicks from Brave New Films (Peace sis! guest blogging opportunity coming soon) hit me up last week and informed me of the premier, I knew that striking out against private equity firms and informing y'all was the thing to do at this time that we pay tribute to Dr. King who 40 years ago was attending and speaking to folks in Memphis about labor and equality and was observing and attempting to mediate a garbage worker's strike. Dr. King spoke many a time on how a fair paycheck for a honest day's work was necessary for both the betterment of our community and our sanity.

No way we can continue to work so damn hard when we get nothing in return.

And plus, I know someone dear to me who works for a private equity firm. You know what they do, right? If not, do some homework this weekend and find out if marginalization and streamlining is right for your employer and think about the outcome and benefits. Who does it benefit and how will you deal with its outcome?

There is a film clip of the documentary and a press release that tells a part of what I'll be doing this weekend. I hope you are doing something just as constructive this weekend, and if you're in the area... I'll be watching the Jones/Trinidad fight someplace special Saturday night.

I hope y'all find me...

From Robert Greenwald’s Brave New Films: Black American Workers to Private Equity Firms & Henry Kravis - Greed is Not Good

(Atlanta, GA) – From the producers of Walmart: the High Cost of Low Prices and OutFoxed, in honor of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., filmmaker Robert Greenwald’s Brave New Films will escalate his media campaign against the leveraged buyout industry with the premiere of a new short documentary video with a message for the presidential candidates. Partnering with the Hip-Hop Caucus and the Service Employees International Union, along with community leaders and members will gather on the eve of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. National Holiday, Sunday, January 20^th, at Rev. Timothy McDonald’s 1^st Iconium Baptist Church at 2pm EST. This screening will serve as a first of a series of community actions that are expected to place economic injustice on the presidential candidate’s radar. Prominent African-American Leaders, including Dr. Steele from the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, Rev. Yearwood, and various Atlanta City Council members, will be present.

A strong advocate of economic justice, Dr. King was a proponent of workers’ rights, especially as it relates to racial economic justice. With the ever-increasing global economy many Black American workers are being impoverished as a direct result of corporate buy-outs and in particular, the corporate dealings of Henry Kravis’ KKR and other Private Equity Firms. Our War on Greed series illustrates the severe economic disparities of the concentrated wealth and power in so few hands while so many Black workers struggle to pay a mortgage, student loans, medical costs, and even basics necessities like groceries and toiletries. The film also addresses the fact that some worker unions have become obsolete in the face of this international greed.

“One guy needed a couple of days off because his mom was on her deathbed or his mom was gonna die… They (company representative) asked, “Is she dead yet? If not, get back to work!”

In addition, Brave New Films has also partnered some of the most influential Black bloggers and opinion-leaders in an attempt to invite presidential hopefuls to the premiere and pressure candidates into pledging to address the tax loop-hole that so many wealthy corporate CEO’s like Henry Kravis enjoy. Presidential candidates and their advisors have been invited to this screening.

Finally, to address the issue of some presidential candidates taking the Black VOTE for granted, through this film and a series of other community actions we are hoping to engage black community members and policy makers, as well as presidential candidates in a dialogue that will benefit Black workers.

ABOUT BRAVE NEW FILMS

Robert Greenwald’s Brave New Films (BNF) is committed to being at the forefront in creating a just America. Using cutting-edge new internet video campaigns, Brave New Films has created a quick-strike capability that challenges corporate media with the truth and empowers political action nationwide. BNF has garnered significant media and political attention from the likes of CNN, MSNBC, the Tom Joyner Morning Show and the New York Times. Our organization has continued contact with major political candidates because we’ve often captured the ‘pulse’ of the social and economic tone of the American people and their attention with our videos garnering over 10 million hits. Our most recent video: FOX Attacks Obama Staffer reached over 300,000 hits in 24 hours.

Day Off? What Day Off?

Hey y'all...

I got something today, it's just I'm just getting up, it's my day off and I'm not used to the Pacific time zone yet. Well my sleep pattern is.

And I gotta drop the wife off at work
And get groceries
And some lactose free milk that I can tolerate with my morning cereal
And think about what I'm making for dinner
And make time to have lunch with my other half
And call my mom on her lunch break to get names and addresses for the reception thingee
And do my paperwork for submission when I get back to work on Wednesday
And load the dishwasher
And get the trash out before...
And get the pix off my camera's card using my new card reader (thanks Queen)
And get over to the UPS Store
And Harry and David
And get a new cell phone and change the plan to include more minutes and data
And pick wifey up from work
And get them RedBox movies back from this weekend
And get the oil changed
And follow up on the extended service plan call made to fix the dryer
And make a few phone calls about my Atlanta trip next week

okay, okay... then I'll blog.


Damn, being married adds more responsibility to my agenda. And it's my day off. I promise I'll be speaking to you about non-urban dictates, the importance of voting and Barack's new economic stimulus plan soon. I'm sure you're already up on these things anyway, but...

I did my homework this weekend between playoff football, laying around the house and hanging out at the mall making new friends in the business. You did yours too, right?

Not Black Enough

I've never been this busy before.

I'm chugging along the highways and byways of America safely, enjoying the warmer weather. When you operate a rig like I do, you want to consume fuel in smaller amounts meaning more straight aways, less torque when climbing hills, and you don't want to idle your engine if you don't have to. I spend around $1300 a week for diesel and I'm getting about 7 miles to the gallon. That's pretty good, trust me.

A couple of days ago, I had to blow up and redo my current reception ceremony configuration because it started to get away from me. I refuse to sit and watch our ceremony become someone else's creation and not even be included in the organizational process. I don't know what it is about folks wanting to dictate to you what you want, it just ain't happening around here. My other half and I have a vision already agreed upon on what the reception should be and that's what we're having, nuff said.

Senator Barack Obama probably will win the Democratic nomination for president. He's done everything to convince a racially divided America to look beyond race and see him as not just a candidate but a competent one. Sad thing is, he might lose in the general election to whomever the Republican candidate will be because some of his own folk are hating on him.

It ain't white folks that have scrutinized Senator Obama to death, it has been black folk. I think most of you know that the Senator reps my district in DC (yes, I help put him in the senate with my vote and physical support here in the Chi). We attend the same church (well, when there's no cover) and stomp the same ground when it's time to eat, drink and be seen. I don't know him personally, but other than the time I spent in Texas and certain times from 2005 to now when I was on the road, I have first hand knowledge of his work. This cat has his hood pass and has put his ass on the line for the good folk here and got a ton of things done on the city, state and national levels. For us. All I ask it that you look at his service record from the time he was at the law firm to the times we put him in office at the state, then federal level.

Although I haven't made up my mind on who I'll cast my vote for in the general election (hint) I never gave thought to the stuff I'm hearing out of the hood that Barack Obama ain't black enough. It ain't that hard finding folks from Chicago that have benefited from bills, laws and programs established, passed and created by the Obama camp. What angers me is that a lot of folks haven't even tried to do the simplest in research but have an opinion on his qualifications.

I might not even vote for the cat but at least I got his stats. And if I didn't live here I would have at least hollered at family, frat, associates, looked at his MySpage joint, accessed his official Senate page, watched a few You Tube joints. Put his name in CNN.com or the Washington Post archives or some newspaper(s) to at least see if there were articles and editorial written on him. I would have listened to Warren Ballentine, Al Sharpton, Michael Basden, Steve Harvey, Tom Joyner, Wendy Williams or someone to see if he came on their respective shows and gave info, lip service or whatever, but that's just me. I like to know who candidates are that'll rep for me to the rest of the world. It is my life and I live here, might as well get to know who the keyholders might be.

To write this cat off and say he ain't black enough is straight ignorant. Scuse' my French, but who the eff are YOU to determine who is anyway? Funny, but I even hear cats talking bout him winning the whole thing just to get shot because America has it planned that way. I guess whether you like him or not, voting for him or others Barack Hussein Obama will never be black enough for you. Like you counted all of the white folk in your lineage and found none, or your service record of acts performed for people he ain't blood related to is better than his.

Remember something. We only make up 11 or 12 percent of this populous and no one is running for the presidency of Black America. JFK was younger than Barack with less experience. G.W. Bush had less experience than that. Clinton never dibbled in foreign policy, but Barack is the current mediator to end Kenyan violence (his daddy IS from there). So I guess what I'm asking is who is black enough?

America ain't voting for some Newport smoking dude with a wave cap and a few baby mommas. They ain't voting for Nat X either. Here is a responsible family man, educated and versed in grass roots politics that wants a shot at running this country.

Bunches of white folks have selected him to lead them out of the rut started by other white folks. And there are viable white candidates out there. What make you so damn special that you can't even give this dude consideration because you don't know? It'll be sad to see him get the nomination and lose because black folk hated on him. I wonder when another cat like this will come around. It ain't like we had one like this before. Even Jesse and Rev Al will tell you that.

You don't have to vote for him, but at least find out if ANYONE is worth your vote.

1 866 my vote 1 - some of us don't have much time to register.

Tip:
Register for the primaries under whatever party you want and then RE-REGISTER as an independent for the general election. Make these cats work harder to get your vote. If you stay with the party for the general election, the candidate will not campaign to you, he or she is already depending on your vote. But if you're independent... Someone has to swing you over, which means more info to help you make an informed decision.

Damn, I'm long winded...

What the Fcuk is a Caucus and No, You Can't Use it to Seal Your Shower Tile

The political process in America is simple.

They express what they can do, we investigate and then we act based on facts, service record and action.

There is a caucus today.

Iowa is smaller than most states, and there are few minorities living there. We must be observant with this evening's process. There is a HUGE difference between a caucus and an election. With a caucus:

• They gather (around 6pm central tonight I believe) And discuss each candidate.
• Arguments are made for each candidate. Spirited ones, so this should be good.
• If a candidate does not get 15% support, he/she is dropped from discussion.
• After the lower tier candidates are dropped, reshuffling of top tier ones occur.
• The REAL arguments begin and some folk will change their stance (via group vote)
• Final arguments are had, then (about 200,000 from what I believe) there is a final vote.
• The votes are hand counted, and a winner is declared.

Now see, that's some serious Parliament-type old school stuff right there. I hope us folk in the brown blogosphere are aware because my state and others just have straight elections. At lease the good folk in Iowa get down with it.

I hope that folks take this electoral process seriously and remember that the American political process is one that requires active participation from both sides. The politician isn't the only one who is required to put in work. We have an unalienable right to question folk on their shit and I hope we do so. We also have what's called required rights to question, investigate, veto, impeach and form a militia when things aren't going our way because we are constituents. Don't ever forget that.

Our last president did not have the required electoral votes or popular vote to be qualified to hold office and the supreme court appointed him amidst election nigh chaos.

And we sat there and watched.

The wife and I saw Katt Williams in concert over the weekend and brother man was calling Bush an idiot. I love and respect Katt and all of y'all but I must say that we are the idiots because we sat there and did nothing when we could have been just as scandalous as the various administrations over the years. Note that I said administrations instead of G. Dubya. All he did was delegate authority, took credit and give most of his people work during his two terms. One man (or woman) can't fuck all of this up.

Especially when 30 million registered voters with unalienable rights are watching.

It makes no sense to me how someone could sit there and watch and complain and never question his or her senator or congressman. Some of these cats have been in office for years, so how does the previous administrations get away with anything when congress outnumbers the executive branch and can strike down a veto with a two thirds vote?

We don't hold any one's foot to the fire. From precinct captians to the supreme court if a person made a phone call, wrote a letter, marched, got on TV or used this incredible medium called the intetrnet to do some work and not spread rumors, lies and gossip, we would be free in some respects.

Pakistani folk can't vote like this - Candidates get shot an blown up.
Over 2000 Kenyans came to a church and killed more than 400 folks because of an election.
Our current administration refused to intervene with oil prices by releasing reserves, keeping it near $100 a barrel instead of down near $60. Would have meant gas going near $2. Remember a fill-up under 40 bux??

Funny how text messages in 2007 surpassed emails and telephone calls as the preferred method of communication in the US. Funny how I got more hits with my post on an anonymous blogger than any post I've had in the past couple of months. The internet, viral videos, texting and chat could be used to get that next revolution off the ground, but...

I'm sure we have better things to do than to watch or pay attention to a caucus. From Iowa. With limited brown skinned participation.

If the reincarnation of Adolph Hitler gets in this November, remember... No participation, no complaining.

You have been warned.

Now, back to trifling bullshit, internet scandal and pics of stuff you would never hang on your cubicle walls.

Seacrest, out.

Anonymous Commenting On How I Should Conduct My Business

I try not to get into 'firsts of the year' but...

Sigh.

I have to address something.

I would have kept the a comment on my blog (regardless of what it said) but it came from an anonymous source. Although I have 3 pieces of tracking software attached to my blog and it identifies the IP address, city, state, internet service provider, time, date, URL of the site clicked through to get to my blog and what URL they clicked out on as well as what email client they were signed into (yeah, seriously), blah, blah, blah... The person still went thru the trouble of leaving an anonymous comment.

I'll go out on a limb and say at least I know about you. Hell, I might be wrong in who I think you are. Nobody's perfect, and I know I'm not, but you already know that. From the amount of pages and certain posts read from my archive, you seem to know me better than folks that stop by here on the regular. For that, I thank you. I like folks that do their research.

To be honest, I would have responded to your comment about my wife in the positive in regards of the info you provided me with.

That's right, I said it. Now I'm not calling my wife the vile names and think of her in the negative, but we already knew of her discretion because she blogged about it. I was also a friend during that whole time and I already knew because that business was already out in the street and if you think of her negatively because of her actions then judge me too. I ain't no saint my damn self.

Hell, I was just in Texas last year in the company of a woman who was a friend for longer than I dated my wife, but... Since you read damn near her entire blog as well as mine you would have known that we've known each other for a year and a half and then we dated. I made a choice to make the quality of my life better by leaving Texas and coming back to Chicago where we got together damn near immediately.

She was here, I was too. We vibed from day one back in the day, but we were with other people doing whatever we were doing before we became exclusive. But you knew that. We blogged about it. You read it. And repeated it. So I guess that's considered old news, huh?

Ask that sister in Texas about my ass. I'm the most trifling son of a bitch on the planet (who owes her money AND rejected her advances) if she tells you, so what does that make me? It makes me human. But I'm not afraid to put that out there because I'll never run from my past.

But then again you spent time reading the post from this time last year when I told of the time I was sexually assaulted. Good post, huh? You probably like the fact that I was touched and I told about it. It makes me a strong black man who overcame a serious indiscretion to get on with his life.

Nah, I'm just another kid from some nameless, faceless poor neighborhood in a large American city that still enjoys life regardless of what happens. I still have breath in my lungs so I really try to find all the good shit so I can take advantage of what time I have left not just to get thru but to enjoy it before my number gets called.

If she blogged about her past affairs then imagine what I know? Imagine what she told me and imagine what I heard from others during the time I courted her.

And I still found enough positives in her to love her unconditionally and to make her my wife. I guess either misery loves company or birds of a feather flock together, huh? I am not Christian, nor am I Muslim or Hebrew but I grew up in that environment and respect the writings and teachings as sacred. I wish I could afford the cover charge, I'd go to church...

I guess Jesus ain't shit for hanging out with that whore and them drunks, travelling the countryside perpetrating that lie about who his real daddy was while hustling gullible folk with cheap parlor tricks and the power of suggestion, huh? I ain't nowhere near Jesus, Muhammad, Buddha, Gandhi, Ronald Reagan, Oprah, 50 Cent or the like, but who am I to judge who's worthy? Who am I to forgive or not based on what I experienced? You have a right to say whatever you want, but who are you to do so and not even have the nerve to put your name behind your comments?

So if my decision was so bad, or if you felt that I was kept hidden from folks so I couldn't learn the truth I feel bad that you feel that way. Really, I do. I was told, counseled, warned, and preached to and so on and so forth and I know as much as a man could know to make the ginormous decision to choose this woman to spend the rest of my life with.

And I'm happy and satisfied with my decision, thank you.

If you have a suggestion for my, then step up into the light and tell me who my soul mate should be. I am always open to dialogue with you. Who ever 'you' are. We don't hide around here, we just do us. Because we have lives beyond then internet (check my frequent flyer miles since July) sometimes we make choices to just enjoy life wherever we are and don't feel the need to report shit to the internet. When you sign my check (oh shit, I'm an independent contractor, so you can't!) and pay our mortgage then I'll feel the need to get your approval on who I do and where we do it. Until then, all I ask is for you to come into the light and use your name.

It's then that your comment can stay.

And for those that want to know what the comment was... You probably know by now. Hell, I just blogged ad nausem about it.