Watch the full episode. See more Tavis Smiley.
Just when I say I am out, they pull me back in.
The gravy train keeps on flowing. Now Brother Cornel and Tavis Smiley are adding some closure to the "Is President Obama Black and Progressive Enough?" battle royal intervention/spectacle of these last two weeks.
In the above interview, Dr. West really did a great job of fleshing out some of his claims--and also displayed some intellectual Aikido and misdirection as he called out the "chattering classes." However, there are/is still a meta-level set of questions hanging in the air, questions that to this point have not been thoroughly explored.
Stated simply: first principles have not been satisfied.
This error in reasoning and argumentation has created an entry point for much of the back and forth bomb throwing on the West-Obama episode that has occurred on many websites...and of course here at WARN.
Ultimately, who gets to play the Black authenticity police?
More specifically, what and who is a free black man? What does it mean in this context to be free? What does it mean to be black? How does masculinity complicate the narrative? What happens when those words--which are laden with such great socio-political weight--are put together? What synergy occurs (or not) in that phrasing?
Help a brother out if you could. Many are building an argument based on notions of authentic negritude which are not being interrogated. Thus, unstated assumptions are taken as matters of fact (and agreement). To my eyes and training this is lazy thinking that we all should work to transcend.
So, let's have some real talk about our priors, first principles, and definitions--especially before convening a drumhead court on the deck of the USS Blackness for the purpose of convicting President Barack Obama of crimes either real and imagined.
73 comments:
TMK, men who are free have at least a strong enough sense of self that they don't have to cling to essentialist ideas of masculinity, don't need to make a big show of genderbaiting women and other men or gaybaiting the queers with repetitive non-sequiturs.
Free men haven't confused being a threat with being a childish nuisance.
Who knows what CW meant by it when he said it. What has happened in the WARN comments is Thrasher lapsed into his usual MO, latched onto a vague, somewhat throwaway phrase, and reduced it to a vacuous, parroted, copy/paste cliché.
My initial thought. You can't get away from this one, Chauncey, because it is a watershed moment. In the Obama presidency and the history of the US. It is a moment when the mass of black people learn something new about the relationship between race and politics. It is the moment when the black wall around Obama begins to crumble. That is going to lead to a great revelation about the true nature of our government among a core Democratic constituency.
Can you imagine? Someone actually wrote an article critical of Obama on Jack & Jill?
CD,
SO you have returned on your own volition clearly no one forced or compelled you..
"Ultimately, who gets to play the Black authenticity police".. That is a flawed question and reflection of your bias and problem with this issue..You have framed this narrative based upon your reality and experiences..
"especially before convening a drumhead court on the deck of the USS Blackness for the explicit purpose of convicting President Obama for crimes either real and imagined"
Excuse me CD I don't observe any one certainly not me nor CWest indicting Obama for any Blackness crimes..I don't observe any one in Black America convening any hearings against Obama...I observe a series of talking points and people like me and others talking truth to power even when the power is a Black man..
I have posted on WARN that Black Authenticity questions is a creation and a cultural asset and tool we created to confront our reality in nation that enslaved us etc...It is a real 24/7 functional social utility in America for us..
We have always wanted to know if the cops, executives, educators, etc who work in the white system are "down" are "real" do they have a consciousness that is centered in negritude and a BLACK AGENDA= AMERICAN AGENDA construct..
I will never retreat, concede, surrender, compromise, nor run from the reality of being a FREE BLACK MAN..
Nor will I fill in the blanks, conduct a survey, register,pledge, whatever/whenever/however/whenever anything that seeks to define for me what is a FREE BLACK MAN
I am a FREED BLACK MAN unabriged, unemcumbered,everything known and unknown, written and unwritten, omnipotent,omnipresent,omniscient, universal, global, local, poor, rich, spoken, unspoken verbal, non-verbal, clinical, experimental, vague, straight, seasoned, credentialed, warm, soft, happy, sad, human, positive, potential, possesed, alpha, omega, king, prince, griot, warrior, forever, immortal, ........................................................................................icon, legendary, sexual, vocal, silent, stern, oiled, content, ambitious, normal, abnormal, peaceful, caring.....................FREE BLACK MAN......More to follow....
@Thrasher. You wrote: "Nor will I fill in the blanks, conduct a survey, register,pledge, whatever/whenever/however/whenever anything that seeks to define for me what is a FREE BLACK MAN"
Okay, that is cool. But again, please tell me what a Free Black Man is? And on that point and with the love principle, can't Free Black Men benefit from some critical self reflection every now and then?
CD,
I thought my post addressed the vagued question of What is a Free Black Man? Perhaps I did not articulate it enough... I could piggy back on West's ideas and constructs...I imagine I could carve out a detailed manifesto, a glossary, a tome, etc...Yet I won't because such an excercise is a reflection and model of a western zeitgeist...
A Free Black Man is a defined and undefined idea and convention etc...Oliver Wendell Holmes once remarked I am paraphrasing 'I know it When I see it"..A Free Black Man encompasses a metaphysical space for some to a defined space for others..
Of course Free Black can and should benefit from all manner of critical self reflection 24/7... I have never argued that Free Black Men are gods or above the law .. I have never created a narrative that we are beyond approach or immune from any criticism.. I am not sure where this question is coming from to be candid with you..Perhaps when a Black person in secured in his own skin that offends others???
In any event I know I am a work in progress and this issue and dialouge is long over due and wonderful and a transformative moment for some in the Obama era...
To be continued no doubt...
Oh Crap,
I have no idea what you are referring to nor do I accept nor validate any of your attacks on my personhood... Practice what you Preach is what I often tell self rightous folks like you and others...
Please accept my comment as one who is simply a fan of the discourse i find on your blog and many of the others you link to. I love the fact that you take on deep issues that in fact have no right/wrong answers though some would suggest otherwise. Thank you and all your contributors for getting the thought train moving by raising and addressing uncomfortable issues we may be in denial about. Cheers to you CDV! I also love the fact that you are a fan of the greatest tv show that has ever been on tv. The Drumhead, is just one in a litany of classic tv episodes from the StarTrek franchise.
Good selection of Star Trek TNG episode here. You have really gotten me to think
@Thrasher
I have no idea what you are referring to nor do I accept nor validate any of your attacks on my personhood
I am referring to what's been linked in CDV's post, the threads with you hiding behind hollow phrases like "free black man" to take out your personal aggressions on others, including me, CNu and CDV.
But it all does work out, since I don't accept any of those namecalling sessions about my personal sexuality, gender, internet presence, or whatever other fantasies about me that make you nervous.
Free men know the difference between their obsessive fixations and objective reality.
BTW, that was Justice POTTER STEWART, not Oliver Wendell Holmes who said, "I know it when I see it." He was talking about porn.
Chiming in with Northside Chip and Tone, I love this clip, too.
The Admiral is played by the incredible Jean Simmons. Loved her as an Aimee Semple MacPherson type in Elmer Gantry (1960).
http://youtu.be/30TkCJGsXas
Yes, that is Mahalia Jackson's arrangement on "On My Way to Canaan Land".
Help a brother out if you could. Many are building an argument based on notions of authentic negritude which are not being interrogated. Thus, unstated assumptions are taken as matters of fact (and agreement). To my eyes and training this is lazy thinking that we all should work to transcend.
I'll help you out, since it was to a great degree my fault that things got derailed the other day when I went in on my pet whipping boy afrocentric/demic/pundit/politician "breath and britches" 2nd and 3rd line inheritors of the civil rights movement failures. The Hon. Rev.Dr.Prof.West clearly falls into this gumbo because perched high atop his upper-class and tenured position at an Ivy league institution, he has never created a single job nor is he capable of doing so.
For the Hon.Rev.Dr.Prof.West to criticize the Hon.Bro.Preznit.Double-O is a simple case of pot v. kettle.
So then, the question revolves down to what has the Hon.Bro.Preznit.Double-O, who, like Jean Luc Picard is a command element in a vast military industrial apparatus, and we should never get it twisted when it comes to the warsocialist nature of the U.S. economy and EXACTLY what that entails - what has Double-O done to the Black brand as articulated by Grace Lee Boggs and Vincent Harding thus;
Over the holidays my old friend Vincent Harding, the African-American historian who worked closely with Martin Luther King during the 1960s (Harding drafted King's 1967 anti-Vietnam war speech) spent several days with me. When he couldn't make it to my 90th birthday party in June, Vincent explained, he resolved to visit me during my 90th year and before I might be leaving this life.
A lot of our discussion centered around how in the last three years of his life, King called for a revolution in values against the triple threats of racism, materialism, and militarism. Why do most King celebrations back away from or ignore this message? Is it because he was going where most Americans don't want to go — so that there was almost a sigh of relief when he was assassinated?
King's challenge was not only directed to white people. As Vincent put it ten years ago: "All we need to do is look around us and see how much over the past 15-20 years we black folks have decided (consciously or not) to fight racism by seeking equal opportunity or a fair share in the nation's militarism and materialism. In other words, we have chosen to fight against one of the triple threats by joining the other two."...
My man ProfGeo keeps it tightly 100 as always. The question revolves down to whether the Black American brand should ever be suborned to militarism and materialism? Obviously, it was a brand forged in the white-hot fire of racism, which is a political economy in which one human grouping is targetted as a prey "species" by another human grouping.
How is it objectively different for the Hon.Bro.Preznit.Double-O to assume command of the vast warsocialist apparatus of the American deep state and further evolve the GWOT (clash of civilizations) in which Muslims and now Africans have been framed as the adversary prey species?
Is it acceptable for the anti-materialist, anti-militarist Black brand as articulated by MLK to be appropriated and repurposed as the face of predatory American militarism and materialism?
Oh Crap,
Justice Stewart was piggy backing on Holmes original comment of course he was talking about porn I cleverly connected my linkage with FREE BLACK MEN narrative..
Again please refrain from making me the villian because you are an intellectual coward who sought to play the pity LGBT card which I shut down before you tried to asert it..
FREE BLACK MEN like me don't play pity /victim games..Take notes and always practice what you preach..
CNu,
I accept your apology..
Fuck you Thrasher.
Keep my name outcha mouf porch monkey - or brace yourself for something exponentially more severe than yesterday's trivial humiliation.
The USS Enterprise hardly conjures images of Jacques Yves Cousteau and the Calypso on a five year mission to explore strange new worlds, to seek out new life and new civilizations, rather, it seems more like Bucks heavily armed and professionally staffed pussy wagon on a five year mission to seek out extraterrestrial strange for James Tiberias Kirk.
Bottomline, Double-O is at the helm of the Federation and his casting in that role by his Brookings Institution patrons is a clearly calculated application of the our collective social capital to the predatory military and materialist ethos of the Anglo-American federation.
Lovers of this ponerological barbarian culture may be enchanted with this turn of events, no one daring call themselves a humanist or a Christian could possibly be..., as Nietzsche would have said, "we should all insofar be honest with ourselves".
CNu,
WoW..Who knew old Black Librarians had such nasty mouths..
So I guess I won't be getting an invite for BBQ this weekend at your house..I was going to bring some sweet potato pie and some collards..
Have you ever consider toys with batteries?? Your post was full of venom.. Perhaps it is something else in play here??
Can you help FREE BLACK MAN out sista?? In the famous words of Mars Blackman...please, please, please, please baby please please baby, please baby ..please, baby , baby , baby pleassssssssssse..
I was going to bring some sweet potato pie and some collards
rotflmbao,
stop playin.
you know you more a cheeseburger type jiggaboo...,
CNu,
One of my law professor's told me I was best student he ever encountered mastering the socratic art of questioning and oral presentations..
In the spirit of the CD's love principle and my respect for his domain..
I forgive you..
Peace & Love....
@Nomad. Black folks criticizing each other in public. Progress or setback?
@Tone. Thanks for the love. I try. This doesn't work without all of you. Be sure to chime in.
@Northside. Classic episode. There are also a ton of great books on the politics of Trek. Check them out.
@Cnu; Thrasher; Oh No. Group hug! You know that you want to.
cheeseburger DID promptly flap his DSL's about his alleged "mastery of oral presentation" didn't he..,
the questions I raised were for you CD. why your eager willingness to gossip at length about the various and sundry contrived intrigues of entertainers on the American political stage, but plainly demonstrated reticence to question the "first principles" of the Enterprise itself?
I wanna hear what you have to say about what Double-O signifies wrt the death of the black american brand so carefully constructed by the first-line auteurs of the CRM which achieved its zenith in MLK's Christian, humanist, anti-materialist, and anti-militarist doctrine?
Ankle-biting among proxies is of comparatively little interest to me - bromantic drama not being my cup of tea...,
CNu,
You did take the promptly take the bait ...lol,lol.
BTW your query to CD from my vantage point is a disjointed as most of your shallow mumblings.
Of course give your station in life of late I realize your query to CD was the best an old librarian can must now days..Need Milk???
Cna. wrote: "the questions I raised were for you CD. why your eager willingness to gossip at length about the various and sundry contrived intrigues of entertainers on the American political stage, but plainly demonstrated reticence to question the "first principles" of the Enterprise itself?"
I am always mindful of structures--see my allusion to how this is all 3 Card Monty, and my repeated signaling with the language of "interverted totalitarianism" and the decline of American empire.
But, we all have a role to play, the dissection of the metalevel game is your expertise. I play in those waters but you are the pro.
@CD
Black folks criticizing each other in public is generally not cool. Black folks criticizing a political fraud, black or white. Very cool. Very, very cool.
@Thrasher
Men like you are very easily manipulated. I would not call that a state of freedom.
BTW I don't even identify as "LGBT", so if you're going to try and misquote me, next time, try making up something that sounds like what I'd actually say.
Or, you can just keep indulging your filthy self-generated fantasies of anticipation.
Either way, you will never, ever, get what you want.
@CNu
cheeseburger DID promptly flap his DSL's about his alleged "mastery of oral presentation" didn't he..,
That, he did. Famous last words.
@CDV
@Nomad. Black folks criticizing each other in public. Progress or setback?
Historical, famously kicked off in the 20th c. by Booker T vs that Black Ivy Leaguer to end all Black Ivy Leaguers, WEB DuBois.
http://bit.ly/hBTBrH
Today, it's become a simple function of showbiz.
I wonder what West hopes to accomplish on the steering committee of the New Progressive Alliance, complete with white bigots who think they are going to use West to implement a Negro Re-education program, and who run to Craigslist to place ads for primary challengers.
Rotfl!
@Thrasher
Justice Stewart was piggy backing on Holmes original comment
You are as wrong about this as you are delusional about everything else.
You can't even quote ME right, so I suppose correct attribution of historical figures is out of the question.
@CNu
Is it acceptable for the anti-materialist, anti-militarist Black brand as articulated by MLK to be appropriated and repurposed as the face of predatory American militarism and materialism?
Or these dorks... http://newprogs.org/blog
Check out the picture they chose to represent themselves. Check out that steering committee Why has CW thrown in his lot with a bunch of born losers, wtf.
CD ducked my kwestins like they were hot bacon grease OC, why you try'na change the subject on me too?
I don't give a dayyum about which ensemble cast of entertainers crusty cornel associates himself with, what I care about is what you think about the Hon.Bro.Preznit.Double-O's signifying on behalf of the unsustainable and non-negotiable American way of life?
You know, the one that's centered on a starkly militarist/materialist modus operandi, orthogonal to the anti-materialist, anti-materialist ouevre of MLK?
Is that an appropriation of the black brand with which you're perfectly comfortable and well at ease?
@CNu, I wasn't trying to change the subject. I thought the subject was CW and this free black man business.
To answer your q., though, I have never seen Obama as an MLK 2.0, and have always figured him as just left of the DLC, ever since the infamous "purple states" speech in 2004. So I don't see him re-appropriating the brand you're talking about.
Now, an imitator like Herman Cain, desperate for authenticy points doled out by white bigots, was recently seen literally appropriating MLK's "free at last" refrain in his 2012 kickoff.
And that Glenn Beck/Lincoln Memorial rally goes without saying.
But even those two are not much of a worry, since the only people dumb enough to fall for it are the rightwing's counterparts to the left's "please validate me because I voted for a Black person, once" types.
In short, I think the black brand you're talking about is greater than any single politician or even historical figure such as MLK. It's more than the sum of its parts.
Way back when, Dr. Sonja Ebron dropped the most serious knowledge I encountered wrt the American motive for invading Iraq.
Cool, clinical, non-plussed, entirely rational and in keeping with the national security policy comprehensively disclosed by Fred J. Cook in his 1962 masterpiece, The Warfare State.
Deeply substantiated, not at all fringe, and entirely plausible.
Now I see EXACTLY the same bankster/gangster MO re-inacted by the Hon.Bro.Preznit.Double-O in Libya - arguably the first Africom assault on the African continent.
What up sis? What kind of globe spanning malicious mischief and killer-ape barbarism is being murderously enacted in my here-to-date unimpeachably good name?
In short, I think the black brand you're talking about is greater than any single politician or even historical figure such as MLK. It's more than the sum of its parts.
I said something along these lines to Cobb today.
Please peep Ebron and Kaiser and tell me what you think about their root cause analysis.
Really... We got two inflated woman who hide behind a mask who actually think their chatter has some currency..WTF
Oh Crap
Why would I want to quote you a fringe LGBT whose obessed with FREE BLACK MEN...Threaten me once in a while with a reason to pay attention to your chatter..
CNu
Unable to impress or influence me so now she seeks to rip CD..Old woman in heat..WTF
Here is the deal both of you closet creatures matter in here because I have shown an interest in you yoyo's but for me none of your chatter in here would amount to anything...I create the fizz in here ..Just stay in your lanes and react to me...lol,lol,lol
BTW I will be slamming this week end with some grits and granny's fried chicken and corn batter water biscuits just for breakfast..Just sayin..lol,lol,lol
Free men don't use a gender/sexuality card for a crutch, because cards don't work very well as crutches.
@Oh Crap
It's a non sequitur. It is generally progress to criticize what's wrong. Line from Temps. "Black is a color, just like white. How can a color determine if you're wrong or right." There is somewhat of a problem in the ways blacks criticize each other. Our own special brand of ad hominem. But you have to crack some eggs to paint a tempera. When somebody offends you personally, you have a right to respond. I like the fact that Dr. West said "I don't like to be disrespected". He could have added "even if you are the president of the m-f--king USA".
@CNu
What up sis? What kind of globe spanning malicious mischief and killer-ape barbarism is being murderously enacted in my here-to-date unimpeachably good name?
I actually remember that piece from BC, back in the days when people still used that term "root causes". I'll have to look at the other one and get back to you. What became of Dr. Ebron?
I'm basically against US intervention and our war machine -- specifically every mucked up effort since ww2 -- including this latest Libya mess. However, I don't know about others but I knew I was not voting for an anti-war candidate in 2008, because there wasn't one in 2008. There has never really been one with a shot of winning an election in all the years that I've been voting.
You may have seen Sirota's piece on the treatment of Osama vs that of Ratko Mladic. http://bit.ly/kkOM2b. I think all 3 of his conclusions are off, but I was amused at his dropping the race card in #1. Since when do white progressives give a crud about race execpt when they can use it as a prop?
So no, I don't particularly like it that one of ours is currently heading up US interventionism. But I'm also not "disappointed" by it because in my view, we could have expected this.
I don't think it makes these wars any more egregious, or hellish, but I guess you're of the school that it adds insult to injury. I see that argument, but it's not my personal view.
@Nomad
There is somewhat of a problem in the ways blacks criticize each other. Our own special brand of ad hominem. But you have to crack some eggs to paint a tempera.
Yeah, it's an elevated form of the dozens, except it takes two to play it. In our showbiz age, it's now just a part of the news cycle. Lol I think outside WARN comments sction, most have probably already forgotten about Obama v West v Harris-Perry v Glaude v Sharpton versus versus versus.
Oh Crap,
Spare me the projection..You have never had a Free Black man in your life if you you would know we don't play cards or respect woman who hide behind a mask..
Now run along and find a group to join so you can be the pitiful Black LGBT on a mission ..
Better yet pick up that old hag CNu and talk about me and how I would make a great new renaissance Free Black Man Sci-Fi figure for our youth to model....lol,lol,lol
@ nomad,
Oh Crap and CNu are creations of the chatter class..I don't have a problem with this development in marketplace but it has it's limitations especially for our youth
The absence of real time exchanges arrests the full maturation of a person..So what you get is people similar to Oh Crap and CNu part time people whose currency only exists in chatter venues..
They wear their entire personhood on their internet persona's..I have met many of these intense internet personalities in real time and more than ofetn they are like empty vessels of ether..They look like zoombies and more importantly they can't grasp the moment..They are point guards with zero court sense..
It is a problem which can imperil the next generation..I am concerned just look at the intense feedback from these two woman..WTF
Oh look, another internet crank incensed because he'll never get what he believes he is naturally entitled to.
Yawn. Who said there are no Black teabaggers.
What became of Dr. Ebron?
It looks like she fought the good fight, but now she's struggling more than just a little bit.
The particular struggle in which she engaged is very close to my heart because it's addressed to an aspect of our collective lives that we have the power and means to change - but lack the knowledge, skill, ability, and will to embark upon.
The complete absence of a coherent policy from Double-O's administration in this area comprises one of its signal failings.
CNu,
FYI...Liberator Magazine will soon be publishing some of my commentaries...I welcome your remarks!!!
BTW..I doubt if Gil would have been a part of Obama's inner circle he was a Free Black man of course..
Wowsers, Professor, good job trying to moderate this mess. Reminds me of a class of tenth grade juvenile delinquents I had one year in a small city in northern Thailand. Learning English was the furthest thing from their minds. There were never more than half of them there on any given day; some of the girls were flashing me their panties; most of them would rest their heads on their arms if I even looked at them; they came and went as they pleased; newspapers were read; inappropriate jokes were made. I had to invent rather wild games to motivate them at all. Some days I just gave up and read a magazine.
So I admire your efforts to come to grips with this turmoil. Good thing you've got your magic lasso handy.
fredc,
Lasso's??/ Sorry but Free Black Men are not animals nor tenth grade delinquents...Not to worry of course I often invoke the wrong verbaige when making a point..
BTW I am not conflict avoidance kind of Free Black Man..I find it informative and critical as one navigates in the world..
When I was an educator I was pleased when I notice my students were full of passion and interested in having an opinion..Perhaps your opinion is just another exampleof the cultural differences between communities..
One day I hope to read a post of your where you are not affirming CD's policing of the discourse but instead jumping in with your insights and your lasso revolving in the air ....lol,lol,lol
Enjoy the holiday from afar
Peace & Love
Why must every urban center, every discussion involving black intellectuals and black politics be infected by a useless, unemployed, self-promoting huckster like Greg Thrasher?
http://www.wdetfm.org/detroittoday/entry.php?entry=514
@Fred C. I am just directing traffic at this point. Have you ever seen George Clinton in concert? He really doesn't do anything except sort of semi-sing and scat while sitting back and watching. On this thread that is what I am doing as I do not think that we will ever get a definition of what a "free black man" is? Seems like a riddle of the Sphinx.
CD,
Perhaps you should ask Cornel West that question...BTW I don't think we are ever get a definition of what a "FREE BLACK MAN is not as well on this site"
Must be another riddle of the Sphinx...
Lens,
You still stalking me after all these years..WTF
Still upset that I own my own company and now working for the man like you..You still upset that WTF..
I was going to offer you a job but I don't employ intellectual cowards who hide behind a mask and stalk me , sends me hate mail etc..
It just not what a Free Black Man would do...lol,lol,lol
I vote that it means long term unemployed, self-promoting, no constituent having - and therefore wholly unaccountable piece of black trash - living in his mama's basement.
http://www.dpbrokers.com/default.aspx?locationid=45351&subaffid
What say you?
LENS,
I vote cowards who hide behind an alias who stalked Black men of my caliber with my footprints in the city is probably also impotent..
I vote that cowards like LENS and others of his ilk resent people like me who owned thier own business and have the ability to make a difference in the lives of so many..
I vote people like LENS and others are probably poor souls that lack self worth and as a result of thier failed station in life remain envious,angry anf finally low self esteem nobodies..
I vote cowards like LENS and others who hide behind a mask were probably in the same room, elevator, event and in my presence and yet did nothing, said nothing, probably even requested my autograph of course being the FREE BLACK MAN I have always been..I probably gave my autograph to this coward...lol,lol,lol
LENS here is an FYI for ya..My TV show is now #1 PA show in the county..I also pen the #1 Blog for AOL/PATCH and I am the most read pundit on voice of detroit.net..
BTW send me you real name and address and I will forward you my photo with my signed autograph at no charge...tee hee
"My TV show is now #1 PA show in the county..I also pen the #1 Blog for AOL/PATCH and I am the most read pundit on voice of detroit.net.."
You have evidence to back up any of these claims Gregory, or are we just supposed to take your word for it?
btw - did you thank your mommy for cooking you that chicken/grits/gravy this morning you overaged biscuit-head freeloading freak?
LENS,
I only seek validation when I parked in the Detroit Opera lot after an splendid evening of Tosca..
BTW I neglected to mention I'm as you know an a frequent guest of American Black Journal( longest running Black Theme Show on PBS)..I also write for DETIP TV and when I have the time I also inspire folks at MLIVE, Craig Fahle's Show, ..I could go one but one must have some sense of modesty...lol,lol,lol
In any event I do actually understand the obession of people like you with regard to iconic personalities like myself...I simply have a extraordinary talent especially in person live and in color of simply being a one of kind marvel of the universe...lol,lol,lol especially in a region of this shallow depth
I do of course give all of my credit to the FREE BLACK MEN & FREE BLACK WOMAN in my life and even to venues like WARN where despite my reservations about our brillant house man who employs a pseudonym CD operates the finest establishment on the block...This incredible venue without any censorship or filters creates transformative exchanges and discourse no where to be found on the World Wide Web..
Anyway off to get some fried chicken, mac and cheese, pork and beef ribs with some of mammy's broiled okra..
You know how to find me...See ya..
LENS,
BTW A brother gotta pay his bills..Please do a better job of promoting my link!!!!
http://www.dpbrokers.com/45351.dp
Who are you trying to kid Gregory?
You KNOW your mama's paying most of your bills out of her social security.
How else could you persist in being a freeloading black man?
Okay, Greg, I'll put on my Man-Jacket and offer an opinion. A free Black man ("person") would be someone who played the hand that they were dealt and made their way in the world, without crying about not getting that Red Queen, without blaming the dealer, without complaining that the game was rigged, without grudging the other players having a better hand, and who learned to win with two pairs if that's what it took.
Black Americans have been doing this for centuries now, so it can be done. After centuries of never getting the good cards, being dealt off the bottom and table-staked, and watching the good pots being dragged away by others, Black Americans are still in the game, and that is a wonderful testament right there.
By the way, never make the mistake of thinking that all White people are dealt a great hand. My full-house has a queen missing.
I should clarify: that first paragraph is my definition of "free" for anybody, anywhere in the world.
@CNu
The complete absence of a coherent policy from Double-O's administration in this area comprises one of its signal failings.
That's something I hear a lot of, out my way where we're looking for the next tech boom (one that doesn't hinge on people purchasing objects that don't exist, or building towns and farms that don't exist, either). What would you recommend?
I recommend a sweeping federal education/propaganda program similar to the one launched decades ago to change the public perception of cigarette smoking.
This one, however, would focus on making saving energy and becoming highly energy-efficient - the cool and desirable thing to be.
Some areas of collective behavior need to be federally astroturfed in order to get people off their inert and unresponsive behinds.
Simultaneous with the grassroots level of consumer behavior modification, there needs to be a unitary regulatory push implemented on utilities to implement significant (100's of megawatts) of demand management capabilities cooperatively with their consumer rate-payers.
The fact that Double-O's DOE hasn't addressed any aspect of this, and, that his DOD (the single largest consumer of energy in the U.S. and the world) hasn't made ANY moves in any of these directions signals the extent to which the administration is detached from this problem.
While Europeans are looking to go from 5000 kilowatt per capita consumers, we're wallowing fat, wasteful and stupid at 12,000KW per capita consumption with no corresponding quality of life benefits to show for it.
Coal gasification is an example DOD level changeover in energy sources - as also molten salt nuclear reactors.
The simple fact that there is little-to-no movement on any of these fronts is very worrisome with regard to the known, predictable, and thus planned alternative impacts on society that significant further declines in net available energy sources will inevitably produce.
No love is not tough love, it's just the absence of care, policy, planning and preparation. Can you imagine how far along we'd be if the efforts of the Carter administration on the energy efficiency and energy independence fronts had been sustained and carried forward by subsequent administrations?
Fredc,
Impressive because you had the courage to face the perils of a white man speaking in a den of Black folks and you did not wink, pander, appease but you gave us you!
I respect that as much as the insights for the record..
I intentionaly avoided CD's lesson plan in part because I am not his student nor am I seeking the professor's blessings..I also did not care for his paradigm etc..
I imagine I could have defined a Free Black Man with the formal list of attributes etc..But why wrap a rope around a Free Black Man..
Enjoy the holiday I really like the recent drafts of WARN"s comments section now we are almost there no games, no agenda's , no masks...
And then,my second thought. A "free black man" is an oxymoron. To say black is to say unfree. And though we few who are outside the penal system are "free", it's a circumscribed freedom. Besides can we really call ourselves free when such a disproportionate number of us are locked up? It would be like asking a free-black (usually mixed) in slavery times if he were free. Well, yes, relatively speaking. To the extent that the white supremacist power structure will allow. Look at the most powerful black man in the world. Doing the bidding of his corporate masters. Is he free? And if he isn't free, are any of us?
Nomad,
Interesting talking points...I would opine that an aspect on freedom is a relative concept to each his own of course..
With regard to America given our legalized racial caste system I propose such relative constructs have limits..
Yes some not all of us are locked up, Yes Obama is an agent of the industrial military complex, etc etc..
I just know I like being the Free Black Man I have earned the right to be...In any state of reality relavtive to real world..
Don't burn the meat..
Peace
@CNu
Can you imagine how far along we'd be if the efforts of the Carter administration on the energy efficiency and energy independence fronts had been sustained and carried forward by subsequent administrations?
Those are the first that came to mind, that, and how Nixon passed the EPA in the first place.
Interesting ideas about the education drive. If it can be done in a generation after two gens of an all-out assault on the populace via radio and magazine ads, tv, film, everywhere one looked there were smokers and smoking, it can be done with energy.
Instead we get thought-stopping phrases from Michael Steele/Palin i.e. drill baby drill, and people fall for it.
@Nomad
Look at the most powerful black man in the world.
Not Black, by some people's standards, not Black enough by others. And yet, he gets The Treatment.
Some of The Treatment, e.g. birtherism/tentherism is due to white America's own lies they tell themselves about their own purity. They know they are lying to themselves about their own superiority, which is supposed to be based on that purity, yet believe those lies, anyway. The cognitive dissonance that results is never pretty, present era included.
The Blacker-than-thous and manlier-than-thous among us have a similar problem, though theirs is much more abstract. And, it NEVER results in the same kind of destruction of communities or lynchings, rapes, and murders made infamous by angry mobs of white conservatives. Sticks and stones.
A third thought.
"Free-dom?...That is a worship word, Yang worship! You will not *speak* it!" (Star Trek)
@ nomad,
Tragically to many Black folks misinterpet a question about Blackness as a 'The Blacker-than-thous and manlier-than-thous among us have a similar problem, though theirs is much more abstract"..
..These people simply do not understand this basic cultural utility of Blackness..
Of course it is not a problem for Black progressives and Free Black men like me, West and others..
Not only does the Administration lack an energy efficiency/conservation strategy, it's like a deer in headlights on climate change, as well.
Horticulturalists are busy planting swamp oaks and sweet gum trees all over Chicago to prepare for weather that will soon resemble that of Baton Rouge. That would be fine if there was a limit to global warming in sight. But without plans to rapidly dismantle the fossil fuel industry, something no one in our corporate state is contemplating, the heat waves of Baton Rouge will be a starting point for a descent that will ultimately make cities like Chicago unlivable. The false promise of human adaptability to global warming is peddled by the polluters’ major front group, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which informed the Environmental Protection Agency that “populations can acclimatize to warmer climates via a range of behavioral, physiological, and technological adaptations.” This bizarre theory of adaptability has been embraced by the Obama administration as it prepares to exploit the natural resources in the Arctic. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced recently that melting of sea ice “will result in more shipping, fishing and tourism, and the possibility to develop newly accessible oil and gas reserves.” Now that’s something to look forward to.
“It is good that at least those guys are taking it seriously, far more seriously than the federal government is taking it,” said the author and environmental activist Bill McKibben of the efforts in cities such as Chicago to begin to adapt to warmer temperatures. “At least they understand that they have some kind of problem coming at them. But they are working off the science of five or six years ago, which is still kind of the official science that the International Climate Change negotiations are working off of. They haven’t begun to internalize the idea that the science has shifted sharply. We are no longer talking about a long, slow, gradual, linear warming, but something that is coming much more quickly and violently. Seven or eight years ago it made sense to talk about putting permeable concrete on the streets. Now what we are coming to realize is that the most important adaptation we can do is to stop putting carbon in the atmosphere. If we don’t, we are going to produce temperature rises so high that there is no adapting to them.”
The Earth has already begun to react to our hubris. Freak weather unleashed deadly tornados in Joplin, Mo., and Tuscaloosa, Ala. It has triggered wildfires that have engulfed large tracts in California, Oklahoma, New Mexico and Texas.
What are you hoping to accomplish? Look yourself in the mirror and know the person staring back loves you unconditionally, recognizes every effort you make and only hopes for your happiness. Now imagine if everyone looked in the mirror and acknowledged the same. Color is God's variety; not the undoing of humanity!!!
@Nomad. That is some classic ghetto nerdness.
Tragically to many Black folks misinterpet a question about Blackness as a 'The Blacker-than-thous and manlier-than-thous among us have a similar problem, though theirs is much more abstract"..
Don't many, though. /eyeroll
Congratulations. You got one copy/paste right, now for those quotations of SCOTUS members.
Oh Crap,
Guilty!!! Start my perp walk..Plaster my photo in the chatter class post office ..A google search gone wild...lol,lol,lol
To err is human...I was wrong about the author of the SCOTUS who stated" I know it when I see it"..It was Powell not Holmes as I posted....Of course and more importantly this is not germane to my thrust of my talking point of course Free Black Men now and then will make clerical errors....lol,lol,lol,lol,
@CD
What can I say. I did name myself after a Star Trek episode.
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