DarkStar Spouts Off

Year End Notes

Some year end notes...

Most Public Notable Event Of The Year

To me, the most notable event of the year, non-death related, is Dick Chaney shooting his friend in the face while hunting. First, it's notable because Chaney is an avid hunter and he should know never to shoot without making sure the path between you and the target is clear. Second, and most note worthy to me, is that his friend, face jacked because he took bird shot in it, apologizes to Chaney for causing Chaney(!) all of the problems because of being shot!

DAMN!

I'm tight with a few friends but if one of them shot me because he was careless, we would have some serious words and I would have to lay hand on him.

Most Private (That I'm Willing To Share) Notable Event Of The Year

That belongs to my daughter. After having fun her first year of college and being asked to take a year off from that school as a result, she went to a trade school for a few months to gain a skill. I disagreed with it but she did what she wanted to do. She then enrolls in a junior college and gets back in the academic groove. She's going full time and has a full time job.

I'm happy because she's getting back her swagger.

Private Notable Bonus Of The Year

Mrs. D.S. has given me cards on our anniversary, my birthday, Christmas, and D.S. 2.0's birthday from D.S. 2.0 that lets me know she appreciates the job I'm doing as the head of the household.

Now, I'm just doing what needs to be done to keep the roof over our heads, everyone's stomach full, and everyone decently closed. Since Mrs. D.S. has become a stay-at-home mother, it's been tighter financially, but we can make it. In fact, the double-oh-seven should be financially easier as a few bills get paid off. But even if not, we still would be fine. What would have to be done, would be done.

I don't need a card to say thank you for doing what I'm supposed to be doing. But, it's nice hearing the thanks, especially since the "gender wars" get the press. Knawhaddamean?

And, yes, I do tell Mrs. D.S. that she's appreciated.

Gotta run. Real dot life calls.

Happy New Year!

Saadam

Think about this:

Saadam got support from the U.S. because of Iran.
Saadam goes to Bush the Elder to ask if it was okay if they annexed Kuwait and did not get a negative response.
He goes after Kuwait and the boom drops. So, he later tries to get Bush by having him assassinated.
It fails,  and he get gets his ass kicked again.
Bush the younger comes into office, names Iraq as one of those bad nations. After all, Saadam "tried to kill my daddy". Later, Bush the younger orders the attack on Iraq.
Saadam is captured and hanged.

You have to figure that Saadam is in hell right now, smelling sulfar, hot as hell (HAH!), gnashing his teeth at the replay of him asking if it was OK to annex Kuwait.

Tulia, TX and Alan Dershowitz

Since the media pundits seem to have their knickers in a twist over the Duke "rape" case, being the person that I am, I have to comment on the injustice involved.

I understand that Alan Dershowitz has stated:

“I believe in the assumption of innocence before trial. I believe in the right of every defendant to a fair and impartial trial. I believe in the duty of every prosecutor to seek justice, and not merely victory in the courtroom.

 

“I believe these principles have been violated in the actions of Durham District Attorney Michael Nifong. Elected prosecutors must be held accountable for their misconduct and the prosecutor in the Duke case appears to have withheld exculpatory evidence, failed to interview the complaining witness in a timely fashion and refused to consider obvious evidence of innocence. His entire course of conduct in this case should be scrupulously investigated.”

You must forgive me if I'm a little torqued.

You see, I searched Alan Dershowitz's web site for a mention of Tulia, TX and I came across nothing. Not one mention of it.

Key To Success

Growing up, on many occasions, I was told of two keys to success that are crucial:

1. Be around with people who have succeeded. They will give you the information that you need to be successful.
2. Do not be around people who have negative attitudes. They will discourage you from being able to achieve what you want to achieve.

As I have aged, I've determined that, sometimes, the people who are successful can also be the same people who have negative attitudes.

For example, I worked with a man who was technically brilliant in writing, understanding, and debugging network code. But, because he was on a couple of poorly managed programs, he developed a negative attitude towards management, in general and what he called the "typical path" of a project. The result was, he would be brought into a project to help design the network interface and code the programming interface to the network. After that, he was moved off of the project before he had time to poison the atmosphere.

I discovered he had good software practices and good ideas from what he had learned over time, but I couldn't stand being around him when I couldn't pick his brain.

Frankly, I think that is the problem with public Black conservatives. They spend so much time being negative that you don't want to be around them or hear what they have to say.

Kwanzaa: Nia (Purpose)

From the Kwanzaa website:

Nia (Purpose)
To make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness.

Someone please tell me, exactly, what is wrong with Blacks seeking to improve the Black community?

ISP Issues

I'm having ISP issues and am posting this via cell telephone.

More on my take on Kwanzaa, Saadaam, and other stuff when the DSL stops dropping.

Kwanzaa: Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics)

    From the Kwanzaa website:

Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics)
To build and maintain our own stores, shops and other businesses and to profit from them together.

This one is easy, but it may take more explanation.

Conservative pundits correctly state the way to building wealth is creating businesses. They also point out the comparative low rate of business owners in the Black community, although the rate of Black business creation is outpacing other groups.

So, what is wrong about Blacks creating businesses? Nothing.

The "problem" some have is the idea of Blacks "profiting together" from those businesses.

In The End of Racism, D'Nish D'Souza criticized Blacks for the lack of recycling a dollar in the Black community before it leaves. He compared the Black rate of recycling to that of Jewish people and stated Blacks needed to be more like Jewish people, meaning they need to seek out and spend more money with Black businesses.

Lately, some conservative pundits have focused on immigrant groups banding together to create  micro-lending "institutions" within their community. The basic premise is a group of people of the same immigrant ethnicity form a group. They all contribute money to the group. At intervals, the money is given to members of the group to create, support, and/or enhance a business started by a member of the group. These people are helping themselves by working in a cooperative manner. The pundits have praised these people for doing this, as do I. But, economic cooperation by Blacks is somehow a bad idea?

How can that be?

Tulia, TX

People are writing about the miscarriage of justice going on at Duke University with the "rape" case. But most of those same people didn't write anything concerning the injustice that occurred in Tulia, Texas.

So, I'm going to do some quick blog searching, just to provide links, so that people can be called out on THEIR willful ignorance:

• Tulia: Race, Cocaine, and Corruption In A Small Texas Town
• End of the Tulia Saga?

More coming up...

James Brown Viewing: Bob Davis' Notes

Note: Bob Davis of Soul Patrol provided the following description of his experience at the James Brown viewing. I'll clean up the format later. I'm having ISP problems.

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The whole thing was a surreal experience for me:

I traveled to NYC by train along with legendary Richmond VA broadcaster Mr. Kirby Carmichael and his lady, who drove up from Richmond and met me at the train station in NJ. We reached the Apollo around 2pm via the A train (just like Duke Ellington told us we should).

- I am told that the crowd wrapped around 125th street, all the way to 140th street (THAT'S FIFTEEN BLOCKS) and the line was 10 deep that I saw

- I must give props to the NYC Police Department. This could have easily been a nightmare, but they did an excellent job of organizing and directing this humongous crowd such that there was only minimal disruption on 125th street

- Once I got backstage (thanks to Marshall Thompson of the Chi-Lites) it became kinda like "old home week". I knew many of the folks back there and many I didn't know, knew me.

- I did several interviews backstage with some of the folks backstage, including Mr. Charles Bobbitt Mr. Brown's legendary "right hand man" as he decribed for us in detail James Brown's last waking moments. Soul-Patroller Thomas Hart assisted me in this interview, producer of the documentry "James Brown the Man, the Music and the Message.

- Another interview was with Kirby Carmichael and NYC legendary DJ Kenny Webb as they described just how James Brown was committed to helping Black DJ's to be successful and created an informal network among them that remains intact to this day. He was truly a "GODFATHER" to the DJ's around the country.

- "Rev Al" gave the eulogy at around 6:30 pm. He "tore the roof off the sucka" as he described in detail just how James Brown told him how he created FUNK MUSIC ("the half note") and revolutionized the last 50 years of music, but also spoke of how James Brown was a mentor to him and to all of those around him. "Rev. Al" spoke of how James Brown totally eradicated the term "NEGRO" from our collective vocabularies with a single song. "Rev Al" talked about a conversation that he had recently with James Brown. He said that James Brown told him that he was very disturbed about the things that were being said in today's music and that he felt that they were destructive. And then "Rev Al" ROCKED the Apollo in a way that ONLY a Baptist preacher from the ghetto can and said....

WE CAN'T HAVE PEOPLE CALLING THEIR MOTHERS HOES, THEIR WIVES BITCHES AND THEMSELVES NIGGERS ANYMORE!!!

"Rev. Al" is not a person that I had much respect for prior to this day. But I watched Rev Al stand silently next to the open casket of James Brown damn near all day long, mostly in silence watching over his mentor and then at 6:30 deliver a great speech in tribute to the man who invented FUNK MUSIC and truly created a "revolution of the mind" inside of the heads of several generations of people around the world. And as I observed Alfred Sharpton today on December 29, 2006 I saw someone who just earned my respect.

- Then I went back outside where I did several "man on the street interviews" with some of the folks waiting online (including our own John Rozz, who I somehow found in this massive crowd). John told me that he had been waiting on line for FOUR HOURS. He told me that the crowd on line was "mostly eating chicken, having a few drinks here and there, having a big party and he joined right in with them." I spoke with many other folks on line including a woman who traveled up from Missisippi and two 13 year old girls who all told me just how much the music of James Brown had touched their hearts and souls and why they had to be here today to see him off.

I even saw two of my favorite NYC area promoters out there working the crowd, passing out flyers (including the BIG JAMES BROWN TRIBUTE @ ROSELAND BALLROOM THIS SATURDAY NIGHT)

- Afterwards I jumped on the A train (just like Duke Ellington told us to) with Mr. Kirby Carmichael and his lady and headed back downtown to Penn Station. We got off the subway and had one of those totally surreal "only in NYC moments". We were greeted by a street musician with a guitar and a small amplifier. He was playing the JB's "DOIN IT TO DEATH". It was beautiful and mesmerizing. It was totally from the heart. It made me cry and smile at the same time. I flicked on my tape recorder and told Kirby that it was a fitting ending for the day.....

I'll have more later. I got a whole lotta tape to edit...

Bob Davis
[email protected]

Kwanzaa: Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility)

From the Kwanzaa website:

Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility)
To build and maintain our community together and make our brother's and sister's problems our problems and to solve them together.

This is another easy one.

Conservative pundits say that people, not the government, should be involved in helping other people out. In fact, lately, they have pointed to research that indicates conservatives are more giving than liberals.

Conservative detractors of the larger Black community state that Blacks, as a group, need to work on improving the Black community. So, exactly what is to not like about this idea?

Kwanzaa: Kujichagulia (Self-Determination)

From the Kwanzaa website:

Kujichagulia (Self-Determination) - To define ourselves, name ourselves, create for ourselves and speak for ourselves.

This is an easy one.

Conservative detractors are always spewing idiocy about Blacks and so-called group think. So what is bad about a Black person defining himself as he wishes to be define, and speaking for himself and not other Blacks?

Al Sharpton on Glen Beck

I'm watching the last 20 minutes of Al Sharpton on the Glenn Beck show.

I'll say this again, if anyone who "doesn't like" Sharpton, interviews him thinking Sharpton is a fool, Sharpton is going to make the interviewer look stupid. Sharpton is quick thinking and a word smith master.

He may be wrong about some things, but he will run circles around someone who doesn't know better.

Global Warming or Warming Cooling Cycle?

Is "global warming" a part of the normal cycle or warming and cooling? I tend to think that it is. Jeff Jacoby writes about "global warming" and "global cooling" in this article:

Here, for example, is former vice president Al Gore in 2006, on the threat posed by global warming: "Our ability to live is what is at stake." It doesn't get much more dire than that.

Yet here is climatologist Reid Bryson, in Fortune magazine's award-winning analysis of global cooling in 1974: "There is very important climatic change going on right now, and it's not merely something of academic interest. . . . It is something that, if it continues, will affect the whole human occupation of the earth — like a billion people starving." It doesn't get much more dire than that, either.

Bryson's article is quoted in "Fire and Ice," a richly documented report by the Business & Media Institute, an arm of the Media Research Center. Climate-change alarmism, the report shows, is at least a century old.

Please read the rest of the article.

The article referenced can be found here.

Irony

I don't think that Linda Chavez understands the definition of irony. This is it in a nutshell:

Twelve million illegal aliens in the country disappear overnight. While at first there is rejoicing in some circles, prices at the supermarket go up double digits — that is, when fresh fruits, vegetables, meat and poultry are available at all. Office buildings shut down when there is no one to clean them. Home construction grinds to a halt.

Maybe she needs to read this:

GREELEY - The line of applicants hoping to fill jobs vacated by undocumented workers taken away by immigration agents at the Swift & Co. meat-processing plant earlier this week was out the door Thursday.

NFL: Week 16

Gonna be quick about this:

• Ravens kicked Steelers' butt. Period. They dominated.
• You can't tell me that "Big Ben" isn't suffering from his motorcycle accident and that the Steelers don't miss The Bus. Champs to chumps in one year.
• Eagles surprised me. What more needs to be said?
• Chargers are The TEAM to beat.
• Dallas lost: HAH.
• Giants... The coach is gone. He has to be fired. The team is in a full revolt.

Kwanzaa: Umoja (Unity)

From the Kwanzaa web site: Umoja

"To strive for and maintain unity in the family, community, nation and race."

Isn't the family structure in Black America in need of repair?
Isn't the community of some Black areas in need of unity against crime and anti-social behavior?

Can anyone tell me what is "bad" about seeking to change the negative aspects of the Black community by focusing on the family, community, and nation?

And isn't Cosby's "call out tour" race based?

I Remember James Brown

The God Father of Soul...

When I was a kid in West Baltimore, James Brown owned a radio station, WEBB, which was 5 blocks away from where I lived. The radio station was in a one story building on a corner. The D.J.s did their work in front of a "store front" window. James Brown also owned a hotel in Baltimore. At the time I didn't think much of it. Now I understand that he was trying to build upon the money he made in the music business.

About 3 years ago, Mrs. D.S. and I went to the 9:30 Club in D.C. to see The God Father of Soul, Mr. Jameeeeeeeesssssssssssssss Brown!

First, the Jay Bees came out. They KILLED three instrumental songs! I mean they KILLED it! My goodness, I was listening to pure funk!

Then, Mr. Dynamite! Jameeeeeeeesssssssssssssss Brown! came out and proceeded to rock funk up the 9:30 Club.

I was in heaven until he let his wife "get some" in the middle of the set. Afterwards, I was in heaven again.

I'm glad I got to see the man do his thing, live, even if he couldn't do splits.

James Brown's band was THE TIGHTEST BAND I HAVE EVER WITNESSED in concert!

The Pimp Smack Goes To

Donald Trump and Rosie O'Donnell both deserve the pimp smack.

Film shows kids a way up and out of the street

I'm going to link to this with no comment:

Marc Clarke, host of 92Q's Big Phat Morning Show, was having considerably less than a big phat morning.

Clarke stood in the foyer of one of The Charles Theatre's several movie houses, wondering if he'd been out of line and gone too far with some comments he had made only moments before. The movie house was packed with scores of boys -- nearly all of them black -- who had been brought to a screening of The Pact, a documentary about three doctors from Newark, N. J.

That's just part of the story. In fact, if the three were just doctors from Newark, there'd be no story. But Rameck Hunt, Sampson Davis and George Jenkins are three black men who grew up poor in Newark's ghetto. At 16, Hunt was arrested on an attempted-murder charge and might have dodged a bullet when the charge was dropped. Davis served time in juvenile detention for robbing drug dealers with three of his friends. (Davis said in the documentary that two of those friends are now dead, and the third has AIDS.)

It was Jenkins who came up with the idea that the trio should form a pact, an agreement that they wouldn't let Newark's mean streets suck the life out of them. They agreed to become doctors instead.

Today Hunt is on the staff of the University Medical Center at Princeton. Davis is an emergency room physician at two Newark hospitals and works at a violence prevention center, and Jenkins is a dentist who recently became the director of minority affairs at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey.

Three organizations arranged for different groups of Baltimore boys to view The Pact in November. Richard Rowe of the African American Male Leadership Institute, David Miller and LaMarr Darnell Shields of the Urban Leadership Institute, and Imam Earl El-Amin, co-host with Rowe of the radio show Dialogue with the African American Male on WEAA thought the message in The Pact was so powerful that the film warranted a third showing in Baltimore.

More at the link.

Kwanzaa/Anti-Kwanzaa Madness

The anti-Kwanzaa clap trap has started, as it does every year. This quote that I'm jacking from Booker Rising, states all that needs to be stated:

You and your crew of defenders are no better than the people who want to "exsponge" Christ from Christmas. You ALL have a piss poor way of making your points.

Over all the years of fighting, have you noticed a difference or improvement as a result of your battles?  Are you winning?

No?  Why not?  Hmmm, let's see. 

I think people (like myself) who might agree with you are turned away from the message because the messenger (that would be you, B.J., LaShawn, Bill O, the Rabbi who tried to sue over the missing airport Menorrah ... yeah, that messenger) is so doggone irritating!

On both sides of the argument, hollering and screaming about the same stuff every year hasn't made a bit of difference. You think you're taking a stand for something but you, your crew AND your foes have become one big intolerant joke. The only people falling into the trap are the same people who will be mad about something else as soon as the new year hits the calendar.

When will you get it? Don't nobody wanna be all mad and uptight at the end of every year! Well ... maybe YOU do ... but the rest of us plan to enjoy ourselves between Thanksgiving and January 1.

           Angela Ferguson

That's a gem.

Pot, Meet Kettle

This was released today by Project 21:

Members of the black leadership network Project 21 are critical of the District of Columbia City Council's vote to give the NAACP $3.5 million in taxpayer money to relocate the NAACP's headquarters from Baltimore to the nation's capitol.  The NAACP is not a revenue-generating industry and does not pay the full range of DC taxes due to its nonprofit status, Project 21 members say, and also point out that the economic revitalization cited by proponents may actually hurt poor black Washingtonians.             

"Given the District's precarious financial state and its trouble with education and transportation budgets, it's outrageous to use taxpayer money to subsidize the NAACP's relocation," said Project 21 Fellow Deneen Moore.  "Instead, the NAACP should rely on the support of its donors to pay for its expansion and relocation."

There is a big problem with this: Project 21 has not had a press release concerning the Washington D.C. funding of baseball. If you read the entire release, you will see this:

"The District's dollars could be put to better use if they were spent subsidizing people's train tickets," said Project 21 Chairman Mychal Massie.  "As they are already helping Major League Baseball build a gold-plated stadium just across the river, the DC government now wants to use taxpayer dollars to help the NAACP expand its offices and give Julian Bond an unrivaled view of the U.S. Capitol.  While the group will not create many new jobs or even pay taxes, the logic is that it will help revitalize the Anacostia neighborhood.  This creates a problem.  Like Bill Clinton's celebrated move to Harlem, the arrival of the NAACP could hurt the very people it is charged with helping.  Poor black Anacostia residents risk being priced out of one of the few neighborhoods they can still afford."

Let's start here:

Project 21 and The National Center for Public Policy Research are both 501(c)(3) organizations. Project 21 comes under the National Center for Public Policy Research. As such, they don't pay D.C. taxes. The D.C. government regularly complains to congress that the high number of 501(c)(3) organizations based in the District, HURTS the District because of the lack of taxes they pay.

Next, again, Project 21 has not previously touched upon D.C. spending tax payer money on the stadium nor the negative impact on poor people in the area who will be displaced in the same manner that the complex will displace poor people.

Why do I even bring this up since Project 21 is really a non-issue?

Because I heard Massie on the radio today and he's full of it. The release is a hit piece on the NAACP, and frankly, that's fine, but they are lying about the purpose of their attack.

Sexual Assult

I'll let this one speak for itself.

A Hagerstown father says his five-year-old son knows nothing about sex, but the boy was written up for sexually harassing a kindergarten classmate.

Washington County school officials told Charles Vallance that his son pinched a girl's buttocks earlier this month in a hallway at Lincolnshire Elementary School. The school says that meets the state's definition of sexual harassment. Vallance says his son was only playing around and had no sexual intent.

School officials say the incident will remain in the boys file until he goes to middle school.

Citing state data, the (Hagerstown) Herald-Mail reports that 28 kindergarten students in Maryland were suspended for sex offenses in the last school year. Fifteen of those suspensions were for sexual harassment.

A.
MAY.
ZEEEING.

"Americans Won't Do These Jobs"

"Americans won't do the jobs that the illegal immigrants are doing."

I've written and said that idea is a farce. Here is proof.

The line of applicants hoping to fill jobs vacated by undocumented workers taken away by immigration agents at the Swift & Co. meat-processing plant earlier this week was out the door Thursday.

Among them was Derrick Stegall, who carefully filled out paperwork he hoped would get him an interview and eventually land him a job as a slaughterer. Two of his friends had been taken away by Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents and he felt compelled to fill their rubber boots.

"Luckily, they had no wives or family they left behind. But it was still sad. They left their apartments filled with all their stuff. I took two dogs one of them had. The other guy had a cat I gave to my sister," he said.

Greg Bonifacio heard about the job openings on television and brought his passport, his Colorado driver's license, his Social Security card and even a color photograph of himself as a young Naval officer to prove his military service.

I told you so!

Calling Out Bigotry

From Baldilocks:

I’m tired of it all.

I’m tired of the insinuations about Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) because his dead father was a Muslim. I’m tired of the insinuations about his middle name—Hussein—and the racist/bigoted insinuations that I’ve seen on the Right that flow from there. I’m even tired of the assertion that the senator isn’t even really a black American (whatever that means to a group of people who are demonstrably of mixed-race for the most part) because he has a white mother and a non-American black—i.e. African—father and, yes, since his father and my father were/are of the same tribe and nationality, I take that last bit of information quite personally.

...

Considering that most black Americans vote Democrat anyway, perhaps some on the Right believe that black America is a lost cause as it relates to bringing a substantial portion of that number over to the Republican Party. Well, if some of you keep going down the road you’re going with respect to Senator Obama, you can count on that number approaching 100% and kiss the White House goodbye. As a conservative Republican, I couldn’t bring myself to vote for a ticket with the too-Liberal/Leftist senator on it. However, no group of people can stand having his/her heritage being insulted for very long—an issue for which any person has no choice.

Vote for the person who stands for what you believe in—and leave the bigotry at home.

The sistah brought it!

[update]
Here is an example.

Michael Wilbon Nails It

A Hittin' Image

NBA players have endured more scrutiny, pertaining to image, than any other professional athletes in America. This was the case in the 1970s, when the league had to deal openly with the perception that the league was too black and too drug infested. And after a very cozy period with patrons and Madison Avenue from, say, 1984 until about 2000, the league is back to dealing with the perception that too many of its players are thugs.

Whether that's racial code or not, the NBA is a business and Stern is its chief operating officer, and he's had to deal with the perception affecting the league's reality and bottom line. The recent adoption of an age limit, the dress code, and the crackdown on demonstrative complaining to the refs is all part of a larger effort to improve the league's image.

So was hiring a conservative operative to figure out how the league that had married itself to hip-hop could be better perceived by the people who buy the tickets and jerseys.

You can sugar-coat this any way you want but the bottom line is: A black league has to be palatable to white patrons. And black multimillionaires swinging at each other isn't part of the equation. If Stern doesn't send the message that the league has zero tolerance, it's incredibly bad business.

Still, you'll have to excuse me for expressing a bit of cynicism here.

Of the four major team sports in America, basketball has the least amount of fighting. The NHL sells fighting, promotes and glorifies it. Major League Baseball can't go two weeks without somebody rushing the mound to start a bench-clearing brawl, and suspensions are minimal. Pro football, in what seems almost an outgrowth of the mandatory contact, has its skirmishes and fights all the time. Basketball hasn't had a fight in two years.

Wilbon nails it.