Uppity Negro Network™

My sincere apologies.

It must be the start of school if I’m not blogging consistently.  The 100,000 post really doesn’t count as a serious blog, but school has started and I have a full load: Music in the Black Church (in lieu of Intro to Greek 2 taught by an incompetent professor resulting in me dropping a class), Intro to Missiology, Church History 2 taught by an almost nearly inept professor and TA and Intro to Pastoral Care.  Not a lot a heavy hitters, but these are still classes that require my attention, I’ve yet to purchase any books for these classes.

But before I get on my soap box about anti-intellectualism, let me reassure my readers that Part Two and Three of “An Uppity Negro Inauguration” are still in the works–and by the way if ANYONE knows about Blue Ticket Reimbursement packages for the inauguration please drop me an email or leave a comment with what I can do.

So, this week…

1. Apparently, I’ve missed out on a prime opportunity to blog about the now deposed former Governor Rod Blagojevich of the state of Illinois.  Okay granted, the guy got impeached.  I wasn’t that in love with him that I felt he was above getting impeached, but dammit, for all this to get him removed, I hope Pat Quinn turns out to be a better governor than this, because if Quinn can’t do any better than Blagojevich, I’m going to be a one man show to call for a removal of the entire state legislature and make everyone run again for their office PERIOD!   I think this an example of us revamping state constitutional laws.  It’s my understanding that no burden of proof is necessary during impeachment or removal of office hearings.

WTF?!?!?!

Okay, sadly, this time the law isn’t necessarily on Blago’s side, but I hear his call for his U.S. Constitutional rights being infringed upon as far as due process under the 6th Amendment–so in this case, state constitutional laws pertaining to civil matters such as this supersede the criminal law interpretation of the 6th Amendment rights.  Not to mention, we could impeach a president for lying about who he had sex with, recall a president in California because he went back on a campaign promise to not raise taxes, impeach an Illinois governor and remove him from office on still unfounded charges making this no more than political grandstanding and nothing criminal–but this passive-ass American public refused to make a deal about a President who lied about going to war, who took away many of our civil liberties that some would say were constitutionally give to us.

I’m confused, for those who read this part, please leave a comment and clear that up for me.

Seriously though, Blagojevich didn’t receive a fair hearing and the state legislators know it.  It was a kangaroo court of some sorts because all state senators had pre-conceived notions about Blago, and by all accounts, no one liked him and they had been itching to do this for a while.  Personally, I’m not a fan of state recalls–see California and their current governor–that’s why we have elections every few years or so.  I think that’s the process of being a democracy.  However, I think it needs to be stated that we are a Democratic Republic.  In short that means that we elect representatives who legislate on the ideals that majority of the constituency supports: “we the people” don’t have the privilege to vote on every little thing.  I believe that their should be some level of trust in our elected officials, if not a) then you shouldn’t have voted them in and b) vote them out the next election cycle.

And to those who called for a special election to seat U.S. Senator Roland Burris, I simply ask where in the hell did you expect the state to find $50,000,000.oo to pay for it?  This is the same case for Gov. David Patterson and this new lady U.S. Senator Kirsten Gillibrand whom he seemingly picked blindly as soon as Caroline Kennedy asked for her name to be removed from the list of consideration.  Come on people, this is one of the perks a governor gets to have, and I believe that Patterson is the example of the New Yorkers ultimately trusting him to make a decision that’s best for the state (partisan differences notwithstanding).

I guess for all other updating news concerning Rod Blagojevich, just check out D.L. Hughley’s “Free Rod Blagojevich” Campaign he’s launched.

2.  So Michael Steele is the new magic Negro.

I mean honestly come on guys.  This rings of the 2002 Academy Awards when magically Denzel Washington wins Best Actor for by far one of the worst movies according to many in the black community, and Halle Berry wins Best Actress for, by all accounts, getting bukked-nekkid with Billy Bob Thornton.  I mean, I rolled my eyes so hard when my friend said that Steele should have been the presidential candidate for this last election cycle.  I mean honestly, his closest contender was Katon Dawson who just rescinded his membership at a de facto whites only country club in South Carolina.  Here’s another link for more info on Katon Dawson.

I told him I would have moved out of the country.

So, it’s official, this uppity Negro will move out of the country if one of two things happens:  1) If Sarah Palin ever becomes president of the United States and 2) if Michael Steele ever runs for president of the United States against another black male–and oh gawwwwd, if he ran against a black female, it’d be over.

Penultimately, I really don’t have much to say about Steele seeing as how I’m not Republican, and have not followed much of Republican party insides.  I’m not a Maryland resident and have no one that lives out there that has told me much about him, but seeing the few stints on FoxNews that he’s on, I don’t particularly care for him much.  He’s seated at the right hand of Juan Williams in my opinion.  I remember him at the State of the Black Union and he didn’t irritate me much at all, which further leads me to believe of his sellout status along with Williams–that both of them are snarky on television just for the sake of ratings and their own personal aggrandizement.

Ultimately, however, I really think that Steele has on blinders and fails to see the racism that is pervasive in his party.  I’m not convinced that he will, find the evil that lurks in his party, and in the words of a former president, “smoke ‘em out.”  From what I’ve heard from Steele, I heard him more as the one being anti-Democrat rather than being an agent of change within his own party.  I think Black Snob was correct in her assessment (via Melissa Harris-Lacewell) that this was a Republican strategy to make the Republican party seem less white. 

Granted the African American populace votes heavily Democrat throughout all levels of government, we still vote on issues.  The Republican party, neither locally nor nationally seem to have articulated a message socially or fiscally that resonates en masse with the black electorate.  I mean, seriously, just ask blacks in Chicago how do they really feel about Hizzoner Mayor Richard M. Daley.

Now, I really don’t know what to do with the fact that there are now two African American males who are the heads of the two major political parties in the United States.  Harris-Lacewell in her blog The Kitchen Table made the parallel assertion that this may be an instance of white flight on a national level–who knows.  I’d be very interested to hear the backroom conversations of certain Republican elected officials with rural congressional districts with mostly or all-white constituents and wonder what they have to say.

Personally, Steele gives me token black.  I don’t foresee him doing anything that would begin to reach out anymore non-white votes.

What kills me is the random black folks, even some young ones my age, that are running around here thinking that they are the enlightened ones because they are self-subscribed/declared Republicans and the rest of us are the sheeple running after “the man.”

Go ‘head, hope you’ve been practicing you’re “you betchas” and “dontcha knows” by watching rerun’s of Bobby’s World listening to his mother speak because the way that party is headed, Palin is poised to be the next hot thing.

3.  This Troubled Assets Relief Program, or TARP money (yeah, I had to Google it myself) that’s being spent on $18 billion dollars worth of bonuses.

Okay guys, this is the easy part.

I really, and truly wish that Obama–oops, excuse me, to all the Baisden-ites and all blacks who major in mediocrity and who paid George W. Bush ALL the due respect of the title of his presidency–President Obama would take advantage of this Democratic majority in Congress and stop making nice with the Republicans.  I’m not quite sure what he sees down the road, but it’s evident that he’s done much more across the aisle reaching than any other president in recent memory–especially when he doesn’t have to.  I mean, the Republicans had a one person majority in the Senate the last two years of Bush’s presidency and that fool was running around talking about he had a friggin mandate for crying out loud and made no effort to court the Senate Democrats.  (Although, with Harry Reid in place, perhaps he knew what an uphill battle that would have been in the first place.)

That being said, it’s hard for me to understand this FoxNews and conservative talking point of their anti-Obama position because of his “income redistribution” slant when it comes to taxes.  Surely, most surely, these conservatives are not in favor of these $18,000,000,000.00 in random bonuses, comparable to that of 2004 bonuses during a much stronger economy.  But who takes a party seriously when one of their main talking heads, unelected as he may be, makes the egregious statement on the air that he hopes that his president “fails” at his job.

Never thought I’d be the one to say this to this person, but for the UNN to Rush Limbaugh concerning his U.S. citizenship, “LOVE IT, OR LEAVE IT!”

I mean, for mild tempered Campbell “No Bias, No Bull” Brown to refer to Limbaugh’s subsequent comments about CNN as nothing “useless noise” and as putting on “histrionics” we all know it’s time for Rush to go.

 I stand by the gut feeling that the writing was on the wall when we saw Enron fall back in 2001.  We saw what could happen to a house built of cards would fall with just one card taken away, and I believe now we’re experiencing the free fall effects of capitalism gone awry.  This should not be of any surprise to most people, but it still sucks nonetheless.

Also, a quick way to piss off this uppity Negro is not talk about the working poor in this country.

I know it’s not politically correct to talk about them, but they are a viable and voting part of this country.  I think even I fall victim to not talking about them because of my own working middle-class heritage, but there are millions of people in small town America, white, black, Latino, Asian and Native American that work day after day and will NEVER rise to status of middle class.  This past campaign season was yet again another instance of neither candidate even uttering the words “poor” from their lips in the debates.  The best thing going for the poor is Joe Biden.  With Obama naming him the head of the task force for only because of his Scranton heritage which was that of working middle-class.  His parents no doubt understood what it meant to live from paycheck to paycheck with no means of survival past a two week pay period.  It was good to hear Obama say “When I talk about the middle class, I am talking about folks who are currently in the middle class,but also folks who are aspiring to be in the middle class.”

4.  Why in God’s green earth would a lady want to have seven…eight…four…three more kids in addition to her six–because she wanted a girl?!?!  Honestly, I want a big family, I can understand that, but I think what got to me was that she was living at home with her parents.

……

I’ll let that sink in for a moment.

Everyone’s heard the story now, but a few minor details have been left out in the interest of other real news.  Check out the story above on the hyperlink, but I think there’s something to be said about homegirl’s mental status.  She’s a SINGLE PARENT living at home with her mother while her father, a native Iraqi is where–OVER IN IRAQ!!!!  So her overwhelming love for kids, according to her mom, is why she chose to do all of this. 

Okay, I really don’t know the ethics behind how many embryos she should have been implanted with, but since I’m pro-choice when it comes to abortion, I don’t see why we should have any legislation necessarily behind this either.  

Howsomeever…

…it’s just my opinion that as the doctor or company that does this stuff, should have a moral obligation to larger society that this mother would not be birthing into the world young children that she could not provide for.  By all accounts, homegirl aint really capable of raising 14 kids.  Again, she’s a SINGLE PARENT.  Not an impossible task, but I dare say it’s impossible with out craploads of help when dealing with 14 kids.  Not to mention, this isn’t 14 kids the old fashioned way where number 14 maybe a newborn but number one maybe grown living on their own–no, at the same time this young lady will have to be breast-feeding (YES, she’s crazy), changing diapers, putting them to sleep, changing clothes, feeding and all of this stuff at the same time.  Seriously, the mechanics of this stuff doesn’t ease up until they can dress themselves and tie their shoes, and really you’re just exchanging one sorrow for another pain.

So, hopefully we’re all caught up and perhaps sometime next week I can write my post on the BLUE TICKETS!!!  Yes, if anyone has any information about compensation packages please let me know.  Also, I received the graphic novel Still I Rise: A Graphic History of African Americans written by Roland and Tanisha Nash Laird and I’m about halfway through it, so expect my review for the book soon enough.

And feel free to drop any comments about Blagojevich, Michael Steele and the shambles that are the Republican Party, Obama and this whole middle-class passing the buck on America’s poor, or this God-awful story about these octuplets born out in Cali.

[Watching SNL: we've GOT to get a better Barack Obama because Fred Armisen is NOT cutting it...remember when we had a black male on SNL?!?!?!]

Keep it uppity and keep it truthfully radical, JLL

How does one really write about the inauguration and really capture the moment?

Seriously, what does even a reporter begin to sit down at their laptop and submit the leading story on CNN.com or the Washington Post about the inauguration and really capture the moment, not some file story where they “insert date” and “insert name.”

Seeing as how I got teary eyed as Wolf Blitzer called the presidency for Obama, and by the time David Gergen had quoted Martin Luther King’s “Mountaintop” speech, I let the tears flow freely, I expected to be emotional when “the moment” would come.  But more on that later.

At 4:45, I received the call to wake up and me and two of the teenaged girls were picked up by the parents to be taken to the Shady Grove Red Line Metro[rail] station in Gaithersburg.  It was like 20 degrees outside, and by the time we came around the curve there was a line of cars about 1/2 mile long stretching onto I-370 trying to park at 5:15 in the morning.  We tumbled out, I bought an early edition Post and busted out my Obama stamped farecard and pushed into the throngs of people that had completely overwhelmed the station.  In the time it took us to get upstairs, two trains had fully boarded, and even when we got up to the platform, the station lights were flashing signaling another train was ready to board and head back downtown.

And of course I got a seat.

The train rocked and reeled through Rockville and Bethesda and the rest of Montgomery County (MoCo) and one dude even got motion sick–we kinda laughed at him on the slick.  One woman, under 30 was complaining about having to work, and hollered rudely when her stop came “I GOT TO WORK!  I’M HEADED OFF THE TRAIN!!  I HAVE TO WORK TODAY!” and as soon as she got off someone quipped “She must have voted for Sarah Palin,” and the train laughed a sluggish “it’s 5:30 and the butt crack of dawn” laugh and resumed talking amongst various small groups.

The train more or less unloaded into a virtually empty Metro Center by 6am and we were fully prepared to follow the instructions of having to exit the station and re-enter in order to transfer to the Blue/Orange line.  

See, what had happened was…

….we had tickets.

In fact we had blue tickets.  

That meant that we had to go to south of Capitol Hill and enter from that side.  In fact, we planned to get off the train at Capitol South as Smithsonian and Federal Center weren’t quite close enough.  So, as we transferred to a train where EVERYONE on the train had taken off their jackets and some women  got their funeral home church fan wave going with random magazines and papers because the HEAT on that car was on HELL!  And then I was ready to pop a blood vessel because when the train got to an empty Capitol South station, the doors didn’t open forcing us to get off three blocks east at Eastern Market.  We just wanted to get off the train because it was soooooo friggin hot!

There were people outside hocking their wares–including that bootleg program that looked like it had been mass produced in someone’s basement–along with buttons and shirts.  We walked back west toward the Capitol and one of the girls in our group–let’s call her Becky–said that we could stop in one of the House buildings to use the bathroom and warm up.  Now, personally, I wasn’t really cold–don’t get me wrong, this was DEFINITELY a cold day, and the slight breeze was not helping it.  But, it wasn’t a frigid day like the cold the country had experienced a week before.  But, one must understand that Becky had on some pajama pants that were a BRIGHT lime green, and a pink and blue colored parka with just a tshirt on underneath.

Now do you think she was cold?

Not to mention Becky wears red glasses and donned a brown and blue hat–well at least her head was warm.

So we went into the House building and happened upon the committee room for the Ways and Means Committee, and we saw people going in and out with no specific sign for anything.  And you could clearly see some people looked comfortable being there and others kind of had the WTF look going on.  I was the latter.  Now, Becky had scored the tickets and said that they came with the instructions that there was food somewhere.  Common sense dictated it was somewhere in the Ways and Means Committee room.  So, when Becky and the other girl with us–let’s call her Molly–walked in (remember how Becky is dressed) we saw ALL black people.  Now that wasn’t all unusual, but I had walked in there and they were watching CNN and we had kind of set up shop to try and regroup before heading back out, and then some sweater and plaid shirt dressed young black dude walked up to ME, shook my hand and greeted me, followed by asking “Who are you guests of?” 

I should have responded, “Whoever would prevent you from ending your sentence with a preposition.”

Instead, I politely acknowledged that it was an invite only gathering.  And me and Molly joked walking out of the door if I they stopped us only because they were white.

We walked back outside into the cold weather, we watched activity from the eastern front of the Capitol as the official helicopters landed twice, perhaps carting some of the very important persons, and we meandered down C Street toward First street.  We had come to the first line and discovered it was for those with Orange tickets, so we processed down further arriving where I-395 goes into the tunnel under 3rd street and commenced to wait in line with other people who said they had blue tickets.

It was 7am.

Long story short, because I’m doing a whole blog on the EPIC FAILURE that was the coordinating committee on the crowds, it was 11:15 and we still had not gone through the gate, let alone security and the line that had formed earlier had now turned into a mob of people not knowing what to do.  We were pushing each other, morale had dropped completely and all of us were left standing saying WTF.  Becky and Molly were ready to cut and Becky said she needed to pee.

Well, now I was conflicted.

Molly’s parents said that they felt much “better” because I was going with their girls, and they kind of knew me because–oh, yeah, didn’t say this part, oops, lol–I had done my internship up in Gaithersburg this past summer and I’ve kept in text messaging contact with Molly ever since this summer.  So these girls knew me, they had kind of attached themselves to me as a pair last summer, so this was totally easy to do.

That being said, I was prepared for Becky’s whining to commence when she said she had to pee, and I was just waiting for her to crank it wayyyyyy up.

Well, I had driven (or is it drove) 10 hours and spent some hard earned money to come up here.  Not to mention this was sooooo the event of a lifetime.  We will NEVER have the first inauguration of a black, male president.  So, at 11:25 when it was evident that our view of history was about to be the eyesore of the Botanical Gardens, that I still haven’t visited, and we weren’t going to hear anything where we were, we cut the line and the two girls were trying to convince me to go to Molly’s mother’s job in Rosslyn in Virginia and to go now when the Metro wasn’t crowded because getting on the Mall was going to be next to impossible.  

I think Molly knew that I was conflicted because I just didn’t want something happening to two suburban 16 year olds in this crowd because an irate mother was NOT what I wanted to encounter–and I needed a ride from the Metro station when we got back.

We walked quite swiftly around U.S. Dept of Health and Human Services building and arrived on 3rd street.  I was trying to stake out somewhere that I could stand on a high spot and possibly see something, or at least get to a point to hear the services.  But I kept on walking, and I realized that no one was stopping my progress.  So I kept on going and arrived a very empty Third Street between Independence and Constitution Avenues–and then I looked up and saw a clear sky not impeded by the horrible views of the Health and Human Services building and Botanical Gardens and the masses of people that I had just stared at for the previous four and a half hours of my life.

Then I realized that I had made it.

A grand sense of calm finally came over me.

It was short lived because I heard Diane Feinstein’s voice and we had already joked in the previous Blue Ticket holder crowd that since it was her name signed on the tickets, we all had aught with her.

I got over it, and started talking to three other women; two older black women and one younger.  Probably a daughter, mother and aunt of the daughter.  I was so relieved to actually be there, I could hear clearly and there was a Jumbotron way off in the distance, but it was close enough where you could at least see what was still too far to see in real life.  I asked the group of women how’d they get here and they informed me that they hadn’t left their house until 10:30…

YES TEN FRIGGIN THIRTY….

…and that they had had a full breakfast of grits, eggs and bacon–meanwhile I had had a fat air sandwich about 6:30 when we got of the Metro.

I called my mother, and it I was still on the phone when Rick Warren began his prayer and was promptly shushed by one of the grit eating ladies because “he’s praying.”  The uber-liberal, anti-church seminarian in me rose up and wanted to tell Mother just who Rick Warren was and why the hell I didn’t care what he prayed.  That aside, I felt his prayer was appropriate, and I felt that he summoned up “the Ghost” aka, the Holy Spirit for the prayer–it was evident he prepared for it unlike the senile ramblings he had done the day before at Ebenezer.

In the midst of Rick Warren’s prayer, I did feel compelled to join in with the Lord’s Prayer, mildly shocked that he actually did the whole thing.

I must say, the entire moment prior to Obama’s speech was a series of highs and lows and fraught with my mind staring off into the deep blue space of the sky not helping but wonder who ever envisioned this day.  It cannot be lost, even in the midst of FoxNews and other right-wing wingnuts, that we, as a country, actually elected and swore in a black man.  Whether or not one wants to go down the road of “ontological blackness” and whether or not that qualifies Eminem or not, if Obama was an average Joe [six-pack] who no one knew and seen on the corner of Georgia Ave. and Florida Ave. by the CVS waiting on the bus, he would be black by all accounts no questions asked, and daresay labeled slow because of his patented “ums” and “uhs.”

I spent the next thirty minutes through Biden’s swearing in and Arefa’s song (and she KILLED it by the way, not to mention, she finally looked stylish and not some singing tent which has been the case as of late.  Although, from where we were, we couldn’t tell wtf she was wearing and it just looked tacky.  I came to the final conclusion when I finally was able to watch a real television) and the four piece musical that I saw.

I mean, I still would have opted for HGC to sing, but I guess Morgan State’s choir earlier last weekend in Baltimore was the closest thing I was going to get, but the classical crap was a bit to European for me, even juxtaposed to Arefa Franklin.

Seeing as how after the swearing in part, where I’m just personally convinced Supreme Court Justice John Roberts, who is  going to be one of the very few remaining vestiges to a George W. Bush administration, just couldn’t quite get himself together to swear in Obama completely flubbed and failed at reciting the Constitutionally required oath, “the moment” plateaued during his speech and dipped slightly with the formalities of the day and kicked it up again a knotch with Rev. Dr. Joseph Lowery’s benediction.

Sorry, I just refuse for the day to be lost on the racial harmony that was experienced yesterday, but dammit Tuesday, January 20, 2009 is the third most positive and important event to the lives of black people in this country.  We’ve only had two prior to that–the premier being the ratification of the 13th, 14th and 15th amendments (damn Lincoln freeing the slaves–he only did it in the states that had seceded from the Union and clearly slavery was legal in places like Missouri, Kentucky, Delaware and Maryland {yes, it was legal to own slaves in the District of Columbia as well} and still with that the Emancipation Proclamation enumerated certain Louisiana parishes that were not required to free their slaves which were mostly the river parishes {meaning the Mississippi river divided the parish in two or lined the banks of the Mississippi} including Orleans Parish) and the second being the passing of the Civil Rights Bill of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965 jointly.

Lady Michelle Obama knew what the hell she said when she said for the first time in her life she was proud to be an American.

Without hijacking this post completely, we’re NOT in a post-racial America and this day was definitely a watershed moment.  Just on Thursday night, when I arrived back from DC, I heard someone on Fox, maybe Bloviating Bill-O The Clown say that the only reason Obama won was because….oh hell, I can’t remember, but he needs to remember that it was a slim majority and indicative of impulse voting and that this was proved through the fact that FoxNews was number two in the ratings to MSNBCs 22 ranked spot.  Whatever the case, Obama’s presidency has provided the sweetest revenge ever for me as a black male, I’ve ever seen in the political arena.

Just to see Bush look like “Wow, this is how I’m going out” when the crowd booed him, and to imagine how he looked when Lowery said “and white can embrace what is right” to seeing the epitome of poetic justice as Dick Cheney was wheeled into the proceedings from an alleged back injury from moving boxes packed to move out of his residence.

Now who in America really believes that this trigger happy individual was moving boxes?

That being said, it was truly one of the highlights of my life to see Obama sworn in; to feel it in the air, actualizing hope, conquering fear.   This was a conquered fear that had manifested itself in song “I Wish I Knew How, It Would Feel To Be Free” written by Billy Taylor and Dick Dallas, but made famous because of Nina Simone making the original recording in 1967 and for the first time in the lives of many blacks, we felt free that day.  

To a younger generation, that as Tavis Smiley noted to a rapt audience at Dillard University’s Lawless Chapel in spring 2005, that has not had to live through a collective civil rights struggle, we went to the inauguration because we felt apart of this movement; Barack Obama made sense to us.  Whatever chord he hit, resonated with us and shame on the older adults for not letting us have our moment.  I daresay that the young people that attended the inauguration, this was our attempt to share in the ecstatic feeling that was shared by those who attended the 1963 March on Washington organized by A. Philip Randolph.

Moreover the Republican and conservative sour grapes that they’ve been eating this past week starting on Monday is clearly not birthed out of being black in this country.  Their inability to not understand the fear passed down from generation to generation in black families across this country and the pathology of cynicism (rightly so in many cases) created in the crucible of slavery, Jim Crow and white privilege run rampant lead to the deepest level of hatin’ I’ve ever seen.

But oh, what a glorious day it was to be there.

I can watch Sean Hannity and just sit and laugh because it really doesn’t make a difference anymore.  

Seeing as how I’ll do a whole post about his speech as well, I’ll keep it short and sweet: I think it was one of his better speeches on the basis that I believe he was on the other side of victory and caution and was able to be liberally frank about his vision for the country–yet another thorn in the side of Republicans and self-professed conservatives in this country.  

There’s the old Negro spritual entitled “Were you there when they crucified my Lord?”  and the words repeat themselves and end by saying, “Oh, it causes me to tremble.”  Now, I’m not making the comparison of Obama to Jesus–not at all and this most certainly was not a crucifixion, but rather a celebration, but the ability that when someone asks, “Were you there?” I can answer in the affirmative is a special gift that no one can take from me.

It was truly an experience that I will bore the hell out of my grandkids reminding them ad nauseum that “I was there.”

Keep it uppity and keep it truthfully radical, JLL