Cobb

Punkins

Shelby Steele & The Rejection of Economics

There are plenty of interpretations going around regarding Shelby Steele's recent op-ed in the WSJ.

Shelby Steele impressed me once. A long time ago basically with his one article in Harper's "The Content of our Character" - long before the book was published. Since then, not. I haven't reviewed his work and probably won't. Interestingly enough, I dismissed him much in the same way some liberals have attempted to dismiss me, through a rationale that said he had 'problems' with being black. Then again, I was a Progressive myself at the time, and I had not yet started to play fast and loose with black identity.

I happen to know that Shelby's twin brother is Claude Steele, the originator of the theory of 'Stereotype Threat' and that colleagues of mine in the academy rapped with him. It was through this part of the Kwaku Network that I discovered that Shelby... well he got slapped on the back of the head for having a name like Shelby. Of course, this is entirely unfair, but that's how identity politics works - first determine that 'authenticity' of the messenger...

In the end, I tended to dismiss him on the basis of his comparatively lame academic career as an associate prof at a state school, and thus headed into the long and troublesome romances with Cornel West and Bell Hooks (er excuse me) bell hooks.

Steele's mojo is, of course, assuaging white guilt. I would bet that he's halfway right. But since I don't like his style, I pay him little mind. He's too squishy anyway. If it aint hardball politics and economics, I'm not particularly interested.

Steele writes:
   

The broad white acknowledgment of racism meant that whites would be responsible both for overcoming their racism and for ending black poverty because, after all, their racism had so obviously caused that poverty.

This is a perfect thumbnail description of white liberalism of the sort that is like thumbnails on the chalkboard to me. And it is because Shelby Steele attacks this obvious (to me) fallacy almost exclusively, he is relatively worthless.

One of the places I start is with Glenn Loury's thesis, which is that colorblindness is insufficient to correct the legacy of white supremacy. The (to borrow a term) STRUCTURAL RACISM of the construction of ghetto plantations, puts many blacks in a hole. Just because nobody is digging new holes doesn't mean the playing field is level. There are still lots of blacks in the hole. Colorblindness doesn't fill the hole.

Steele's dialect fails to acknowledge that there are better reasons to fill the holes in the ghetto. It doesn't matter who lives or lived in New Orleans, the dikes should be repaired, the neighborhoods rebuilt, the holes filled up. But continuing the trope of white guilt  and black responsibility begs questions of black economies and white economies, as if it were America's business to keep two separate balance sheets.

Steele concludes somewhere strange and unusual:

And our open acknowledgment of our underdevelopment will clearly give whites a power of witness over us. It will mean that whites can hold us accountable for overcoming inferiority as we hold them to accountable for overcoming racism. They will be able to openly shame us when we are not fully at war with our underdevelopment, just as Bill Bennett was shamed for no more than giving a false impression of racism. If this prospect feels terrifying to many blacks, we have to remember that whites witness and judge us anyway, just as we have witnessed and judged their shame for so long. Mutual witness will go on no matter what balances of power we strike. It is best to be open, and allow the "other's" witness to inspire rather than shame.

This is an argument that obviously has some currency in the annals of 'race relations' but what it is supposed to mean is completely alien to me. What blacks owe themselves is the willingness to understand their capacities under the premise of liberty that citizenship grants. How much of this effort is wasted in matters of exorcising ghosts of whitefolks' assessments can only be testament to internal demons best explained by psychiatrists. That any of this touchy feely accounting translates into political influence is testament to all the things that are wrong with identity politics be they white or black. So no prescriptions or adjustments to such psychic ledgers are going to get us any closer to the nation needs. We need people with houses not made of the strawmen of racial identity politics, but of the bricks of bankable skills bound by the mortar of our educational and economic infrastructure.

Methinks Shelby Steele doth huff and puff too much.

The Sambo Paradox

This week Lt. Gov. Michael S. Steele, a man I respect and admire, was called a 'sambo' because of his association with Gov. Erlich of Maryland. The rationale behind a particular nasty smear of Steele was given as follows:

In an e-mail interview with The Sun, Gilliard said he considers Steele a traitor to his race because he initially dismissed news that his political partner, Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr., held a golfing fund-raiser this year at the Elkridge Club of Baltimore, which at the time had never admitted a black member in its 127-year history.

"Generally, it is an accurate depiction of Steele's groveling, lackey behavior," Gilliard said of the image. "It is 2005, and such an institution [as the Elkridge Club] should not exist, nor should a governor with as many black people as the state of Maryland attend a function at such a place.

I've been thinking about causality recently vis a vis the permanence of the American black ghetto. The first is the issue of ghetto brain drain. Does the black ghetto fail to flower because all of the talented people leave and integrate the mainstream leaving nobody capable of improving the place? Or do the young, gifted and black leave the ghetto because it is such a failure and holds no promise for them? A difficult question indeed. Connected with that question is whether it is in the interest of the getting investment is good for the ghetto. Is it better for poor people to retain the benefits of lower cost housing which is affordable for their low pay jobs? Or should they deal with the challenges of gentrification as proof of a higher standard of living?

These questions are tricky to plumb, but I think I've found one that is not. That is the question of blacks and Republicans. I'll quote an argument that is very common. In fact, a thoughtful person emailed me such an argument just this morning:

The failure of the politics of conservative thought in the Black community has never been a surprise for me I have always known that black people are very astute in rejecting backward ideas, underdeveloped thoughts and philosophies. The media fiction that the GOP and conservative principles are gaining a new foothold  with Black folks is nonsense and is nothing more than the exaggerated press releases of GOP balloon blowers and black apologists seeking affirmation from conservative whites as they mine the lucrative cottage industry of black conservatism.

Even absent the bloviation and my claim that such propagandists wouldn't know Hayek from a kayak, there is one thing clear. Most African Americans have looked upon the GOP as a white bastion and have decided to steer clear. Let's assume for the sake of argument that the vaunted '98%' of blackfolks who have recently polled in opposition to GWBush were even more - say 99.9%, and presume that the GOP was in fact, 99.9% white. It would be very easy to see how a top official in the GOP like Governor Erlich of Maryland would be attending all-white clubs and functions. So here's the tricky question.

Are such GOP functions all-white because of white racism or are they all-white because '99.9%' of blacks refuse to join?

Everybody knows, or should know as black Republicans daily attest, blacks are more than welcome into the GOP. Nothing quite speaks to this fact as the Senate campaign of Michael Steele itself which brought heavy hitters in the GOP to raise over $400,000 recently. He is their best chance to swing the state of Maryland, so this race is key. But if the identity component of some black politics is to have its way, Steele and other African American candidates, movers, shakers and grass roots Republicans will never be considered legitimately black. So despite their presence in the GOP, for cynics like Steve Gilliard a reverse one-drop rule is in effect. If you're black and you have one-drop of Republican blood, then you are considered white. And as long as such twisted logic is taken seriously by black voters, the GOP's 'whiteness' remains an implacable stumbling block.

I have argued in 'The Worst Case Republican Scenario' that if there is any good to be had with influence in America's majority party, then African Americans ought to shed their fears and cross that Pettus bridge into the heart of the GOP. But in this crossing they won't be met with billy clubs, or at least not from Republicans. It seems that black Democrats are the ones with the biggest axes to grind.

You will note that here at Cobb, there are no advertisements. I've gotten a free hotel room for speaking at a conservative function, but even though C-SPAN was there, they didn't even turn on the camera at our session. If that's a cottage industry, I'm still at the curb. But I am fully in the Republican party and doing my part to do Republicanism the way my experience and values dictate. I don't happen to think that this is a very courageous or dangerous operation. I endured being called a 'sambo' in highschool.

I'll paraphrase Gilliard to show the flaw in his logic. In 2005 a whites-only political party should not exist, nor should a country with as many black people as America allow such a place to exist. So who is involved in integration, and who is making racist threats against those who cross the lily-white line?

It's Not Far-Fetched

Black vs Negro: A Note

I am very influenced by the understanding that black consciousness was created in order to liberate the Negro from his mental condition of servitude. It was an intellectual achievment of significant dimensions not only here in the US but in Africa, the UK and Brazil as well.

Black isn't a color, it is a concept. However the meaning of that concept has become degraded. Some Negroes think everything they do is Black. Not so. I say there are some very precise definitions that were generated by Black Nationalism that remain useful today and that much of what goes by the term 'Black' is only derivative of that. I'm also saying that there were some very foolish and shortsighted ideas in Black Nationalism that need to be dumped. My purpose in black conservatism is to separate the good stuff from the junk using an historically accurate and realistic assessment of African Americans and their liberation movements, culture, religion and bearing. All that is what I call the Old School.

I start with what I call the Old School Core Values, and get more detailed from there. This is the project of Cobb.

http://www.mdcbowen.org/p1/cobb/core.htm

So from the perspective of a very basic understanding that 'every brother aint a brother' I have no more problem in making distinctions between African Americans than in distinguishing Catholics from Methodists. There have been occasions when this discrimination has been misinterpreted because I am active with Republicans, that my distinctions flow from some anti-black pathology. (as if they owned black and accurately represented) In fact it flows from the same school of public self-criticism engaged by Bill Cosby and Booker T. Washington.

So yeah, the kitchen is hot.

When I speak of 'blackfolks', I am talking about average African Americans of no particular stripe. The same counts of 'whitefolks'. African American and European American sounds so demographic and precise. I don't always want to be that formal.

When I speak of 'Negroes' it is casually derogatory and should be interpreted in the context of some particular African American who has somehow lost sight of the benefits of Black mental liberation. A 'Negro' may be a fine person but they are not reaching their full human potential primarily owing to a condition of using whitefolks as their existential model. The Negro is provincial and not directed towards self-improvement. And that's way more than I needed to say about that because I almost never use the term. Nevertheless it is useful to recognize that I considered all African Americans (with the possible exceptions of Garveyites) to be Negroes during the period between Reconstruction and WW2.

I bring up this definitional note in reference to a discussion held elsewhere over a prior post of mine "Who Owns Black", which I consider to be both a cultural and political provocation.

Wynton Marsalis: A Hero for the Old School

I've always thought of Wynton Marsalis as a standard-bearer. I just found a very cool piece on him:

"We're blues people. And blues never lets tragedy have the last word." This is an utterly characteristic statement by Wynton Marsalis, the trumpeter, composer and jazz impresario. He spoke those words in a television interview shortly after Hurricane Katrina devastated his hometown of New Orleans. Within days he was playing in gigs to raise money for Katrina victims, including a huge benefit concert, "Higher Ground," produced by Jazz At Lincoln Center, of which he is the artistic director. It has raised more than $2 million. Bob Dylan once remarked that a hero was "someone who understands the degree of responsibility that comes with his freedom." By that measure, Marsalis is a hero bona fide.

Wynton Marsalis: A Hero for the Old School

I've always thought of Wynton Marsalis as a standard-bearer. I just found a very cool piece on him:

"We're blues people. And blues never lets tragedy have the last word." This is an utterly characteristic statement by Wynton Marsalis, the trumpeter, composer and jazz impresario. He spoke those words in a television interview shortly after Hurricane Katrina devastated his hometown of New Orleans. Within days he was playing in gigs to raise money for Katrina victims, including a huge benefit concert, "Higher Ground," produced by Jazz At Lincoln Center, of which he is the artistic director. It has raised more than $2 million. Bob Dylan once remarked that a hero was "someone who understands the degree of responsibility that comes with his freedom." By that measure, Marsalis is a hero bona fide.

A Conversation With Myself Circa 1994

Getting tired of political battles, I've begun to look at culture and was looking for some old hiphop music reviews I may have written in the good old SCAA days. Instead I found one half of a socratic dialog.

(from the archives May 1994)

mellow mike ([email protected]) ever so cleverly scribbled: : somewhat less tho' than a manifesto...

: the deal begins here.
: after world war two, america got rich. we transformed our
: simple minded society to the modern thang. consider the
: autobiography of an ex-colored man as i speak of pre-war
: self sufficiency. a black man, pre-war self sufficient was
: much like the woman who calls herself miss abagail, 106 years
: old if you are watching the stand. i also think of characters
: from sula and the color purple as well as those who lived past
: those times to become ernest j. gaines characters. this is all
: a rural thang. bottom line was that blacks in the south had all
: of the skills necessary as farmers and workers to be completely
: self sufficient. all that was needed was the basic civil rights
: enforcement that we generally got, and boo ya. equality.

: most everywhere else the industrialization of america created
: new classes of people. when we speak of the middle class today
: we speak of people with access to skill sets as employees which
: will get them what they need to survive in the city. segregation
: in the cities is much more easily and rigidly enforced (like
: redlining, etc) than where people settle and live on land for
: generations. to make things short, to be middle class you need
: access to kaplans so that you can score on the sat so that
: you can get to the right college so that you can get the
: right job so that you can get the right mortgage... definitely
: modern, not organic. so self-suffiency (even as mr. grossman
: knows) has everything to do with one's abilities to shop for
: the right politics, books etc. (well that's more post-modern)
: my drift is that what america has become for the most part
: as an industrial nation post ww2 has created a floating set
: of middle class values.

: those particular middle class values *follow* the economic
: plan. only particular cultural groups of 'minorities' can or
: will ignore mainstream middle class values as their 'moral'
: center, largely because in one way or another adapting these
: 'values' will have no real effect on their economic position.
: as a cultural person i am either too rich or too poor to care
: about middle-class values. it is not generally a moral choice
: although i think it should be.

Two Falls, Two Swords

It appears as though the Whitehouse has managed to avoid getting beaned by any of the three curveballs that were pitched last week.

Harriet Miers has taken herself out, and now Scooter Libby has resigned under a cloud of indictment. What is most fascinating about this turn of events is that it has been pressure from within the Republican Party that made these things happen. No amount of Democrat carrying-on has made a dent in the ironclad partisanship of the Bush Whitehouse, but conservative calls for blood have produced results.

From my perspective the failure of Miers is not so good as the resignation of Libby. I would have liked to have seen somebody from outside of the beltway get onto the Supreme Court, and at the outset, this is the single most attractive thing about Miers. But there's no way I would like to see someone without the legal fire to bring some substantial gumption to the bench, and this is what I percieve Miers to have lacked. If she couldn't handle the introductions to Senators...

Libby's demise is, on the other hand, relatively good news. Something has always stunk about this whole Plame game, and it has always been worth a high level head. Even if Libby is taking the heat to save Cheney, this result is better than endless fudging and stonewalling. Scott McClellan must be relieved, because his babbling had gotten completely obscene.

Conservative Brotherhood Portal

It's an auspicious week to begin real discussion about where blackfolks on the right of the political spectrum are coming from and going to. So at long last The Conservative Brotherhood has a new website supporting an open forum and a host of features to support community. I have high hopes for the site, and since we're just getting started, the potential and possibilities are wide open.

Go! Join! Bring it!

Conservative Brotherhood Portal

It's an auspicious week to begin real discussion about where blackfolks on the right of the political spectrum are coming from and going to. So at long last The Conservative Brotherhood has a new website supporting an open forum and a host of features to support community. I have high hopes for the site, and since we're just getting started, the potential and possibilities are wide open.

Go! Join! Bring it!

Katrina Retrospective: God & Tragedy

It's interesting to hear an expatriot view of the American South. I mean there you have the full litany that comes with the turf. If you must speak of blacks you must speak of it in this way, right?

Where are the men? Well for a start, nearly a million of them are in jail. There are roughly as many African-American men in prison as there are in college. Numbers of federal prisoners have doubled in the past 10 years, most of it down to the "war on drugs" and three-strike automatic prison sentencing. In some notorious cases, prisoners have received life sentences for stealing food. The land of the free keeps more of its people in jail than any other. And, of course, the people jailed are disproportionately black. In fact, black men are locked up at seven times the rate of white men. In more than a dozen states, black men arrested on drugs charges are 57 times more likely to be sent to prison than white men on the same drug charges.

In short, many black men are sent to jail because they're black. During the early 1960s, my father was one of them. Of course, as with all racism, it's hard to prove conclusively that a white judge sentenced you because you were black. So my Dad fled the country and was exiled for 40 years. His crime? He joined nine white scholarship students at the LSE for a year, and asked the Georgia parole board (who considered draft-referral applications) to address him the same way they addressed his white peers - using the prefix "Mr". They jailed him instead.

It was a rule of Bible-belt bureaucracy that all blacks were addressed by their first name (like calling them "boy"), and all whites were addressed as "Mr". In asking for the same rights as whites, in a similar way to Rosa Parks on the buses, my Dad was challenging the whole edifice of white rule. So they punished him - hard. And yet after decades locked out of his home, the government told him he could never return unless he could prove the most obvious, yet least provable fact: that he was jailed because he was black.

I thought he would never go home, and that I would always be sent to Georgia, like I was as a child, to represent him at funerals and family gatherings. And then a miracle happened, a once-in-a-lifetime get-out-of-jail-free card. In fact, it was a letter from the 96-year-old white judge who sentenced him, addressed to President Clinton. It said, "I jailed him because he was black." And so my father got a presidential pardon, and Jim Crow's stranglehold on our family was finally broken at the beginning of the 21st century.

I don't see how I can talk about these politics without being political. Certainly I can't be there to tell the story the way I would, but what constantly annoys me is the totality with which such tales are wrought. Black is black and white is white without having changed an inch in generations.

Growing up in California and having family both from New Orleans and New England, it is difficult for me to associate the personal & family connection to the pain and suffering subtext of this tale of woe. I only have a vague sense of what it means to be inextricably tied to a deterministic past by the physical walls of a ghetto town chained to Jim Crow. For my family, the chains were broken and the place of imprisonment deserted.

Except for my New Orleans grandparents, the story is of flight to freedom, a narrative as old as slavery itself. And interestingly enough what brought my nana back was a crime. What I was told was that my mother's mother was a creature of habit and fierce discipline who took her life savings and her young daughters to California in the 40s. She was to start a business here but trusted the wrong man. What was thousands of dollars became nothing and she was forced to take any job to save enough to return to New Orleans. And there she stayed the rest of her life, never to travel again.

I know how a single injustice can defeat a life, but I wonder if it is fair that we capture the import of those lives in retrospect as the victims of injustice. It is not why they lived and loved and bore children - not to be subjects of a tragic morality play which launches us in political directions. The history of struggle is never so clear, unless we have determined to make it so for our own purposes.

Even in my own mind are soundbites of loss attending those setbacks encountered by friends and family this time. Who is supposed to be prepared for hurricanes? Are they no longer considered acts of God? It shows the change in the locus of our chains of recourse. Where we once looked upon other men as simply men answering to the divine within them, with stronger or weaker character based upon their ability to let goodness shine through them, we now look at them as conpiratorial arbiters of our fate, whose machinations bind us to better or worse destinies as determined by the color of our skin. And perhaps it is not skin but some other dimension on the axis of identity that we percieve to be the determining factor. But how is it that men become the reason and that men's behavior becomes the answer? It is a loss for the dialog between self and the divine - it is an absence of God.

My Bit for Sister Rosa

I added a bit of (hopefully) clarifying information about the flexible nature of the colored section of buses in Montgomery this evening over at Wikipedia. It is a fact I recall vividly, but not quite as vividly as where I learned it.

Frapprs Represent!

Spence has found a gem of an application. It's called Frappr, and it allows any to create a pinboard on a map of the USA. There's clearly some Google Maps stuff under it. He's created one here for black bloggers.

Excellent! The site will probably be slashdotted within the week.

Lofty Ambitions

News from Doc. He's engaged in revitalizing Downtown LA:

Lofty Ambitions is an ongoing campaign I'm engaging to increase the quality of life of those of us who choose to make downtown LA home.

As you know LA is in the midst of a huge residential transformation in which HUWs (Hip urban whites) are moving back into the city center en mass. Currently 500,000 people work downtown, but only 50,000 live here full time.

Downtown is the New inner city and it's success will serve as a model for how best to create an economically heterogeneous community w/in city's core.

The first of my Lofty Ambitions is to bring a Trader Joe's downtown. Currently there are no grocery or speciality gormet food stores downtowm. A Bristol Farms, Wholefoods market...etc would all do well here.

November 1-15 i'll initiate a petition to bring Trader Joe's into town. I will leave sign up forms in the lobbies of a few residences.

I spoke with the company and now the people have a chance to register their interest...stay tuned

Sounds delicious.

Depression

A Conservative Review of Black Identity Politics

I've just had a bracing experience in one of the other realms of cyberspace, a webchat forum. It reminded me of the good old days which in the end weren't so good. But like many of our cherished memories, we didn't know how poor we were.

It's certainly because of this experience which I'm fairly certain was witnessed at least in part by Dell Gines (whose blog is currently undergoing a rather queer thematic change from 'urban conservatism' to 'adequate defense') that this post emerged at Booker Rising. Subsequently to that, Ms. Manhdisa registered a few axioms at her site.

Like with the Gay Banana Split, I am fairly convinced that what black conservatives want to achieve and express has little to do with what black progressives and liberals want to hear. So as well-meant as this coaching might be, I think it addresses a point that doesn't need to be made. In fact, I believe that a bit of combat is perfectly well in order precisely because entanglement isn't necessary. Then again I'm only speaking for conservatives like me.

In my case, I found it rather sad that the cat engaging me was literally screaming for the answer to the question - What is the Republican plan for helping blacks in the ghetto? The quick answer to that question, any conservative will tell you in well rehearsed soundbites: We need you to help yourself out of the ghetto - it's a plantation of dependency from which you must escape. Of course when you get down into the details there's much more nuanced stuff to say, but there is one basic undeniable point on which most all on the Right will agree. America is not responsible for solving the ghetto dysfunction. In the infamous post-Katrina phrasing: "You're on your own".

This really sounds harsh to progressives, who are looking for ways to improve life through innovation and reform in government. It sounds downright evil to liberals whose expectations of government are to manage the problems of the relatively indigent. To conservatives, it sounds bracingly honest, forthright with a minimum of BS. It is the political equivalent of spinach, an ugly vegetable that actually is good for you and makes you stronger.

But here's where it get's particularly ugly - we inject race into it. And with race comes identity. As soon as you say 'black progressive' or 'black conservative' you've raised the complexity and volume of this simple ideological conflict. Here's why.

The Black Nationalist movement sought to, and very successfully wedded black identity to political struggle. In moving from Negro to Black, African America enjoined a broad redefinition of itself in the immediate post-Civil Rights America to push harder for those rights and privileges long denied. It was a brilliant idea and it worked. But what it has failed to do since then is adapt to new economic realities, new crossover influence and new multicultural perspectives, not to mention a Republican majority. But its greatest failure has been to evade the trap of identity politics that it laid for itself. If I were more scholarly, I would adequately qualify the separate and distinct influences of Black Consciousness, Pan Africanism, Black Power, Black Arts and Black Nationalism in this mix but I'm shortcutting that. Suffice it to say, that's a lot of blackness in a lot of different directions and it left very little room for any African American to assert any other kind of identity.

The very invention of the term 'African American' was largely due to the problems created by this monolithic identity. In the 1980s we needed within 'the black community' to realize that we weren't all one community. Further, we needed the rest of America to recognize that too. We had to transcend the boundaries of Black and yet be true to history as well. So while the term 'African American' connoted a little afrocentricity, it also allowed us to compare and contrast ourselves to Irish Americans. It put us here in America and there in our land of origination equally, like other ethnics. That was an excellent change. And yet blackness persisted in ways both good and bad.

Just as with 'Negro' in 1968, you'll find people today who can't stand the idea of giving up 'Black' for a new term. People are invested in blackness for an entire spectrum of reasons. The most important is one of identity and positive self regard. Unfortunately very close behind that is the reason of political struggle. 'Black' is potent political stuff. And as many have written, matters of authentic identity are very often entangled with political positions. Both are important, but they are also independent, and I worry that only a few (especially those of us who were born Negro) recognize the difference. People tend to forget that black political/cultural nationalism was an invention, and it's orientation to America was an invention as well. It can't be uninvented, but the pieces must be separated.

For the purposes of my discussions, I have used the example of Nikki Giovanni's Poem to illustrate the difference between mental liberation and political liberation.

I maintain that black mental liberation in the classic Carter Woodson sense is still a necessary component of African American life. African Americans still suffer the deprivations of self-doubt and identity crisis among the hobbling portrayals and racial stereotypes. 'Knowledge of self' is still crucial. It's not hard to get, but it's still crucial.

I further maintain that having achieved this one is free as anyone. And yet the presumption persists that any African American who is truly liberated must only select from a narrow selection of political ideologies. Conservatism is not one of them. Why? It's not because those people we idolize as leaders of the Movement weren't conservative, but because they didn't initiate anything that could be called 'black conservatism'. In the pantheon of black creations of the 60s and 70s there was no 'Black Conservatism'. And so black conservatism is percieved largely as a new invention rather than simple conservation of African American traditions that predate Blackness. Well, that's partially black conservatism's fault for calling itself black - a practically no-win situation.

So the first major problem with black identity poltics is that it's static and monolithic. The second major problem is the rhetorical device I call the 'Black Human Shield'.

When confronted with a conservative opinion which appears to be or is actually in conflict with the expressed or assumed interests of 'the majority of black people', progressives and liberals tend to respond not only in an attack agasint the opinion, but of the blackness of the conservative himself. So deeply ingrained is the notion that the fate of all blacks are tied to that of a few that this attack is inevitable.

Let me be clear in saying that this black human shield phenomenon works both ways based upon the racial myth that the fate of all is sealed by the fate of a few. Black conservatives make the mistake of thinking their exceptionalism can save the race. Black progressives and liberals make the exact same mistake. Where the conservatives tend to speak for themselves as arbiters of advancement for the race, progressives and liberals tend to speak of themselves as spokesmen for the downtrodden whose advancement speak to the advancement of the race. Progressives and liberals have one thing going for them, if the masses of African Americans suffer or gain, more or less as statistical abstracts of them present, they do have the legitimate claim that 'the race' is moving in one direction or another. But they run double the risk of not actually being of the people for which they speak and that there is actually a disjoint between progress for certain blacks and real progress.

For example, law and order conservatives generally draw a hardline on illegal drug use. Progressives and liberals have long argued for decriminalization of marijuana and liberalization of crack cocaine laws because of sentencing inequities between blacks and whites. Liberals and progressives take up the black human sheild of convicted black drug users and say that conservative opposition to liberalization and decriminalization is against the interests of the black race. They engage these positions even though they don't actually advocate drug use and know it to be destructive of black families. So here you have conservatives facing off with others taking polar opposite positions on matters with both claiming the interests of blacks.

This is where the great divide lies between black conservatives, liberals and progressives - over the fate of black communities. And here's where I simply must reiterate what I've said earlier.

Just as for all other Americans, African Americans' greatest responsibility is to their families, not to politically ineffective, overburdened and outdated notions of black cultural nationalist unity. In other words, they should pursue happiness. After all, they're free.

Prehistory

Harriett Miers: Certifyable Lightweight

This headline is too juicy to pass up. Unfortunately, the lawyers over at Volokh are too circumspect to back this up and I don't have time to go chasing all over the 'sphere for evidence to back me up. But Deet was able to find a slam in the LAT the other day which documented an elephant-sized goof in her understanding of the Equal Protection Clause.

As part of this curveball, it appears that there are three camps. The Hewitt camp, loyal to the end; the Buchanan camp, ideological spoilers; and those without much of a position dodging the flying dishes. But with the news of doom and gloom from the Senate as reported by Byron York, I am becoming convinced that perhaps the diehards should die hard. It isn't Miers so much as her being part of a triple threat to the Bush Whitehouse, that's pushing me over a tipping point towards a real dislike for the way W's running things I haven't felt since before his entry into Iraq.

Yes it's Plame, no it's not 2,000 dead soldiers, yes it's my lack of confidence in his administrative abilities. But boy oh boy is it ever Lawrence Wilkerson. More on him later. It's clear that I'm boxing the Christian Right through Karl Rove and blaming Rove for things that clearly Cheney and Rumsfeld were masterminding. But the matter of secrecy and loyalty oaths simply don't belong in the presidency of this republican, and this Republican is just about fed up.

In Da Club

What Do We Not Know?

And how much is it worth to know it anyway?

Tim Burke still sends a decent amount of traffic my way, and while I'm not sure he supports trackbacks, I ought to reciprocate. He concludes:

The cost of higher education worries me enormously. It appears unsustainable as well as unjust. It is aggravating a problem that is somewhat separate in its causal underpinnings, the increasing degree to which universities are exacerbating the reduction of economic and social mobility in the United States. But I’m not sure what to do about it. I think at the least that some of the people most aggravated about it are going to need to get real about what it is that they’re asking for: curricula that are pared down radically to what external funders judge valuable and thus heavily biased to technical subjects with immediate professional payoffs, and institutions with few if any meaningful services beyond education. It would be interesting, at any rate, to see an institution of higher learning built on those principles start up in this marketplace, at least one that wasn’t built around online education, and see how it fares (and just how low it could get tuition).

There is a certain difficulty to be found in attempts to rise above your station via intellect. If a society is not shaped by a fairly restrained idea of intellectual merit, then you end up with the equivalent of tens of millions of monkeys on their respective typewriters. And who is to say which of them is approaching Shakespeare?

This started out to be a thoughtful post, but I've downshifted because of some other recent matters. I'll pick it up if you do.

Too Black, Too Strong

I've been manning the guns over at AfricanAmerica.org which has a very healthy debate over black politics and domestic affairs. They have an engaged group of folks and a good volume. It is somewhat reminescent of SCAA in the good old days.

Also found is the Ascent Blog which is fairly new.

Too Black, Too Strong

I've been manning the guns over at AfricanAmerica.org which has a very healthy debate over black politics and domestic affairs. They have an engaged group of folks and a good volume. It is somewhat reminescent of SCAA in the good old days.

Also found is the Ascent Blog which is fairly new.

Those Who Know Don't Say

Curveballs for Bush

Here come three.

Miers supports Affirmative Action.

Syria was behind the Hariri assassination.

Powell's man drops bombs on the White House.

It's going to be an interesting week.

On the first item, it's going to be another straw on the camel's back. I think Bush will keep careening the nomination into a brick wall. I'll watch the fragments like a particle physicist watches the results of an atom smasher, hoping to get some clue as to the inner workings of the Bush ethos. We already know what to expect from his brain, but his soul is more interesting.

On the second item, wouldn't it be interesting if some US planes just happened to accidently bomb a Syrian embassy. Well, the old maps excues has already been used. I'll use the opportunity to rub peaceniks noses in the dirt. See if they care about this revelation as much as they cared about the Downing Street Memo.

On the third item, the most hay to make is here, because it strikes to the heart of GWBush's control of the party itself. I've said it was a good thing that the Neocons overproduced in the Bush Administration, but I know that as a general rule it could be said that Bush brokered no dissent. Probably because he was outgunned in the brains department. I think the man has enforcers and that Karl Rove is gun number one. But hopefully Rove's star descends as the 'can-do' people emerge. The question is whether the right can-do people are battling the wrong ones and it's decided that fewer can-do people are necessary in the White House.

I wonder if the GOP has the capacity to field the right team for 08. There are many years to figure that out, but it looks like this may be the beginning of the end.

Shack[le] Attack

Cobbski Luv

I love it when ya call me big Cobbski.

If I can do, and it turns out that I might can do, I would play George Clinton and say "shine the spotlight on 'em" all about the Black Blogosphere. So now that I've got some paperwork done and survived a self-imposed Tivo marathon of "Invasion", I'm in the mood to take it light. But I'm also still into the flavor and shape of that thing I alternatively call 'The Darkside' and 'The Kwaku Network'.

I do really want to start the Carnival of the Darkside and get that rolling. So I've bookmarked this joint. I'll figure it out and let you all know. But basically, it's the black blogosphere. The Kwaku Network is less structured but also more well known. I named it after the swahili word for 'Wednesday' as in, the Black Meeting on Wednesday Night. You know, where we all go to get our black information. Of course there is no black meeting on Wednesday night, but who among us has not heard about the Willie Lynch Letter? And where did that come from, huh?

Either way, I am recalling that two of the coolest brothers online call me Cobbski, and one used to call me 'Tuvok', which is also very cool.

So without going through all the trouble of segregating my blogroll, I wanted to offer a brief shout out / reference to those I consider the best of the black blogosphere, from my own personal perspective, although in no particular order:

Jimi Izrael

Bomani Jones

Prometheus6

Vision Circle

Faye Anderson

Kim Pearson

Negrophile

Mac Diva

Byron Crawford

Afro-Netizen

In Search of Utopia

Lynn D Johnson

Listen To Leon

EJ Flavors

Dell Gines

I'm not saying I read y'all on the regular, but I think anybody who doesn't know about you, doesn't know the half. I'm purposefully leaving out The Conservative Brotherhood, because I think they're seminal and that goes without saying.

Now I get my RDA.

Cobbski Luv

I love it when ya call me big Cobbski.

If I can do, and it turns out that I might can do, I would play George Clinton and say "shine the spotlight on 'em" all about the Black Blogosphere. So now that I've got some paperwork done and survived a self-imposed Tivo marathon of "Invasion", I'm in the mood to take it light. But I'm also still into the flavor and shape of that thing I alternatively call 'The Darkside' and 'The Kwaku Network'.

I do really want to start the Carnival of the Darkside and get that rolling. So I've bookmarked this joint. I'll figure it out and let you all know. But basically, it's the black blogosphere. The Kwaku Network is less structured but also more well known. I named it after the swahili word for 'Wednesday' as in, the Black Meeting on Wednesday Night. You know, where we all go to get our black information. Of course there is no black meeting on Wednesday night, but who among us has not heard about the Willie Lynch Letter? And where did that come from, huh?

Either way, I am recalling that two of the coolest brothers online call me Cobbski, and one used to call me 'Tuvok', which is also very cool.

So without going through all the trouble of segregating my blogroll, I wanted to offer a brief shout out / reference to those I consider the best of the black blogosphere, from my own personal perspective, although in no particular order:

Jimi Izrael

Bomani Jones

Prometheus6

Vision Circle

Faye Anderson

Kim Pearson

Negrophile

Mac Diva

Byron Crawford

Afro-Netizen

In Search of Utopia

Lynn D Johnson

Listen To Leon

EJ Flavors

Dell Gines

I'm not saying I read y'all on the regular, but I think anybody who doesn't know about you, doesn't know the half. I'm purposefully leaving out The Conservative Brotherhood, because I think they're seminal and that goes without saying.

Now I get my RDA.

Lust, 1971

Search your feelings. You know it to be true!

Tuskeegee vs Tookie

According to the folks at Wikipedia:

By the end of the study, only 74 of the test subjects were still alive. Twenty-eight of the men had died directly of syphilis, 100 were dead of related complications, 40 of their wives had been infected, and 19 of their children had been born with congenital syphilis.

According to the folks at Streetgangs.com:

Thus far nearly 400 members of both sets have died in the last 20 years and that does not include the bystanders caught in the cross fire. Also keep in mind that many of the decedents expired as a result of non-gang related circumstances such as car accident, suicide, natural causes and conflicts outside gang membership.

You learn something every day.

Tuskeegee vs Tookie

According to the folks at Wikipedia:

By the end of the study, only 74 of the test subjects were still alive. Twenty-eight of the men had died directly of syphilis, 100 were dead of related complications, 40 of their wives had been infected, and 19 of their children had been born with congenital syphilis.

According to the folks at Streetgangs.com:

Thus far nearly 400 members of both sets have died in the last 20 years and that does not include the bystanders caught in the cross fire. Also keep in mind that many of the decedents expired as a result of non-gang related circumstances such as car accident, suicide, natural causes and conflicts outside gang membership.

You learn something every day.

Ulterior

The Black Dragon Fighting Society

OK this guy is the ultimate badass. Check it:

Count Dante personally went to Muhammad Ali's (Cassius Clay) house on the south side of Chicago and challenged the Heavyweight Boxing Champion of the world. Count Dante' also challenged the World Heavyweight Wrestling Champion and the World Heavyweight Judo Champion. Count Dante personally entered the contest and defeated all the comers. The December 1970 issue of Mr. America magazine praised Count Dante for his attempts to update the science of self-defense. In the same article, featured in the August 1971 issue of Official Karate magazine, Count Dante proved the inferiority of the traditional martial arts as they were being practiced at that time. In this book, "The Worlds Deadliest Fighting Secrets", the Count elaborated on the shortcomings of all the present day defense systems. In both this book and his "Karate is for Sissies" article, Count Dante stressed the weakness of the martial arts systems as concerns their use and practicality on the street, and stressed that the self-defense arts should become FIGHTING ARTS. This book and article completely changed the structure, attitude, and application of the martial arts, and since that time most top martial arts leaders and publications have stressed the STREET APPLICATION of their arts and articles much as if they had conceived the idea themselves.

What makes this guy particularly interesting is this comment:

" ...Special note: Proper emphasis on courage, aggressiveness, and actual training hall and street application of effective fighting techniques, is the most serious lacking segment in modern day karate and kung fu schools... most karate schools place little emphasis on courage or "guts fighting" and aggressiveness and usually even frown on it. They also do not permit body contact in their self-defence and sparring practice. This makes for a safe training hall but does little to help develop the body to withstand strike punishment and actually hinders the student when they are forced to use it on the street."

Fascinating. Are we really learning practical matters in our strip mall Karate Dojos? This is the other side of the coin that I will be exploring today when I talk about higher education.

The Whoopi Litmus

A Casual Review of the Digital Divide

I realize that I don't go buck wild quite as much as I used to in these pages. I've become so bloody serious. I need to write some more comics and get those other humours flowing through the veins. At any rate, since I'm bent beyond recognition and dedicated to living on the bleeding edge of my passions, its difficult for me to redact the mix of characters that pushed me to this vector. So I guess I may as well make all concerned aware of some crudely frank yet strikingly correct original positions by way of the following links.

The Death of the Digital Divide

Race, Cyberspace & The Digital Divide

Computer-Show.com

PeoplePC

And now to the serious summary which is what I used in Greensboro - the following string of axioms.

There is no Digital Divide. The Digital Divide is a proxy for cultural dissonance.

My favorite show on television is Dirty Jobs. Our civilization doesn't depend on white collar work, so the digital revolution wasn't supposed to be about blue collar folks. 

The internet is what people who use the internet say it is, and it is way, way too big for anybody to say. People talk about white males being 75% of the internet as if anybody could possibly make sense of 1% of the internet.

When Russians build rockets to leave Earth's gravity they call the thing they're in 'the Cosmos'. When Americans do it, they call it 'Space'. Therefore the Russians will always win the Cosmos Race and the Americans always win the Space Race. So that begs the question. Who wants to be in the 'Blogosphere'? I say everybody who wants to be there is there. If people are there for different reasons, who is to say that they're not happy? If people aren't there, who's to say they're missing out?

Last year, a black guy came out with a blog and said he was the first black blogger from Detroit. Only he wasn't. He was at least two years too late. 

So what we're essentially dealing with is the question of the value of information which has been abstracted onto the net. There is a false presumption that the form and content of information that has value for an arbitrary group of people defines: A) What the Internet is all about. B) The stuff of value that Others have to get. Those who push the concept of digital inequality basically have to take their fight to exotic locales, because every town that has a Wal-Mart has cheap computers for little budgets. All of this is easy for me to say because I recognize various classes of people, and I don't make it a habit to second-guess blackfolks in particular. So if there are 34 million blackfolks who don't spend any time online, it doesn't concern me. I've been online since there has been an online, and I'm sure there hasn't been 100,000 blackfolks who have seen my work. I'm cool with that. If I suddenly discover:

[African American] Internet usage: 61%. Percent who regularly go online for news: 25% (up from 16% in 2000)

I'm cool with that too. Now there was a time, in my progressive days, that I had a certain amount of serious concerns about getting IT to the 'hood. In those days I approached a young woman named Micheline Wilcoxen who was at the time Program Director for a joint called Breakaway Technologies. This was fairly early on. It turned out that her big problem wasn't money, but the kind of bureaucratic fights she had to enjoin just to get access to public school kids in the 'hood. I met Micheline at the African Marketplace many years ago and we talked a few times about computers in the 'hood. I was especially interested because Breakaway was located around the corner from where I grew up near Crenshaw & Jefferson in Los Angeles. Understand that Breakaway had its own building, all the computers they needed, funding and staff. But the public school teachers would not let them on campus - basically because they would be showed up. The existence of Breakaway made public schools look bad, so they refused to let the kids learn. Yeah. I was shaking my head too. I have no idea what it takes to become certified as an afterschool program, but I got the distinct flavor at the time that the whole situation was mostly politics and mostly impossible. So I didn't volunteer. Apart and separate from that, I spent a lot of time trying to talk to community groups of various sorts to put their information online via bulletin boards in the days before the net and on the web in the days after. Notably I spoke to Haile Gerima about making a QuickTime version of his film Sankofa and making it available on CD for community groups. This was in the days just after the Power Mac was born and people were nuts about this thing called 'New Media'. Gerima dismissed the notion out of hand. I asked him why, and he looked at me like I was crazy. It's all about the big screen, he said. And he went on to reminesce about the great experience he had when his film debuted in Germany. For Gerima, it wasn't about getting a message to people in the 'hood, it was about filmmaking. Macs aren't film. They're low budget devices. Of course I wasn't the only black person with such ideas about low cost distribution of black mental liberation. There were plenty of pioneers back in the day, but for all kinds of reasons, there was something we couldn't see. The thing I couldn't see in 1993 was demand. I thought that good ideas provided their own juice. It's something of a naive belief, but I had plenty of company in that regard. I still thought that "If you build it, they will come." It's not true. You don't know who 'they' are until they show up. And if you think 'they' are the target market, the black, the poor - those for whom so much rhetoric and moral suasion is invested these days, you will be sorely disappointed. It's only a question of how quickly you'll be disappointed. So when I was trying to figure out why the cats at Netnoir were so upscale and shiny, whilst my partner and I were focused on serious black history, what I didn't really want to accept was that everything needs a business plan, and that communications is big business - even on the web. Generally speaking, you can't reach millions without spending millions, and millions aren't just lying around waiting to be spent. There are too many reasons to be online and to remain offline for anyone to suggest they have a handle on them when it comes to African Americans. So the Digital Divide is a theory ever in search of a target, and as time moves forward it adjusts again and again. There may be a new Digital Divide theory that evades every criticism I've laid down here. Maybe the Digital Divide is in Somalia today. I can't say. I don't study it. The joy I get out of computing and computer mediated communications is practically boundless. I've been playing and working with computers since 1974. Everything here has always made perfect sense to me, but I don't have a hard time recognizing that lots of folks don't get it and don't need to. I think the barriers against those who want to experience the joy are negligible. Even water's not free, but I don't think any real divide is keeping Americans from quenching their digital thirst.

Admit It

A Black Day

The kids are home from school. I'm on the beach. I have some expense reports to complete but otherwise I am free to indulge the braincells. So here's what I've decided to do.

I'm going to have a Fishbone marathon on the iTunes and read something from every black blog on the Negrophile blogroll. I am therefore going to create, my own instant Carnival of the Darkside.

For some reason, I have a creeping sense of claustrophobia in the black blog world. I tried to get a million people to pay attention to the fact that John Conyers was online, and nobody cared. Or so it seems. OK so let me plumb the depths and see what I come up with. In the italics will be the Fishbone song which may or may not have anything to do with the blog excerpt of the minute.

Subliminal Fascism
(damn that was quick)

Bonin' in the Boneyard
When was the president really going to fire Karl Rove, asks Blackprof.

Jai has got some kickin' gear. Portable DAT. Me like.

Mighty Long Way
Allison bemoans life in NYC. But at least there's De La Soul and Lauryn Hill.

I'm not sure what to make of Faye Anderson. Is she turning into another bitter and ineffective clone of Julianne Malveaux? This week she's full of piss and vinegar. Nobody meets with her satisfaction. She just cries out for outrage. Yeah well I have those weeks too.

Change
Shana cracks me up with her parody of Kirk Franklin. I've had those weeks as well.

Hey Ma & Pa
Now I know what the baldheaded dude was all about when I cruised through Oprah yesterday. Thanks Rod.

Pouring Rain
The Brotha Code is dead. Don't bother.

Chippla is all over the world. Too deep for me.

Dell Gines wrestles with a moniker. I hope he keeps conservative, for a number of reasons that I won't go into. I like his stuff a lot.

Ghetto Soundwave
There's a huge group blog Global Voices which ain't black but brown. What to make of it? Too much to tell. Just know it's there.

Dare Obasanjo hipped me to upcoming.com. Cool stuff

Love & Hate
Mz Powderpink is partying with Brey-Brey and also putting hilarious words in GWB's mouth. Damn. My eyes hurt after reading that blog.

Cool photos at Bluemoaner.

Servitude
The Humanity Critic tracks the faded careers of Da Brat, Saigon and Royce da 5'9.

Somethings just defy my sense of the real. One of those things is that it might be actually possible to write down a recipe for gumbo. I'm looking at it, but I just don't believe it.

OK it doesn't matter what Honeysoul has to say, just check out the mugs on the sidebar. Damn, where was the blogosphere when I was single?

Nuttmegg
Obsidian Bear explains 'hasbiens'.

Planet Grenada is in the same place as I am. Time to review what the blogosphere is.

Wait a minute... I just realized how huge the Negrophile blogroll is. I'm never going to finish this. I guess that's going to have to suffice for the moment. Maybe I'll update some more later today. My head is starting to swim...

Kevlar in Kemet

Squabble

It's the battle of the Jesses!

Jesse Lee Peterson, et al., v. Jesse Jackson, et al. (BC 266505) will go to trial in Los Angeles County Superior Court after a ruling last week by Judge George H. Wu. Judicial Watch filed the lawsuit against Jackson, his son Jonathan, and others on behalf of Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson, who was the victim of a physical and verbal assault at an event hosted by Jackson’s Rainbow/PUSH Coalition and Toyota Motor Sales, U.S.A., Inc. in December 2001.

I know there is a God and that he has a sense of humor. He put these two against each other for our amusement.

Conyers Alert

Hear Ye! Hear Ye! Rep John Conyers is blogging this and next week.

For me, the journey into blogging started with the Howard Dean for President campaign. That campaign's groundbreaking use of the internet made many of us stand up and take notice of a new generation of progressive activists, dissatisfied by the corporate mainstream media (or the "MSM" as they call it. These activists also shared with me a dissatisfaction with the passive politics as usual that has -- at times -- become a modus operandi for the Democratic party.

After the Dean campaign, I began to talk with many of the architects of this internet strategy, most often with Joe Trippi, about whether the Dean model could be used to benefit congressional Democrats. Trippi was emphatic that it could.

I think this is probably a first, and Conyers needs a bit of props for stepping into the void. So if you're in the neighborhood, go give him a shout and tell him what's on your mind. What was on my mind was, what the hell took you all so long. Hmm. It couldn't be the myth of the Digital Divide could it?

See for yourself.

Conyers Alert

Hear Ye! Hear Ye! Rep John Conyers is blogging this and next week.

For me, the journey into blogging started with the Howard Dean for President campaign. That campaign's groundbreaking use of the internet made many of us stand up and take notice of a new generation of progressive activists, dissatisfied by the corporate mainstream media (or the "MSM" as they call it. These activists also shared with me a dissatisfaction with the passive politics as usual that has -- at times -- become a modus operandi for the Democratic party. After the Dean campaign, I began to talk with many of the architects of this internet strategy, most often with Joe Trippi, about whether the Dean model could be used to benefit congressional Democrats. Trippi was emphatic that it could.

I think this is probably a first, and Conyers needs a bit of props for stepping into the void. So if you're in the neighborhood, go give him a shout and tell him what's on your mind. What was on my mind was, what the hell took you all so long. Hmm. It couldn't be the myth of the Digital Divide could it? See for yourself.

Who are the Real RINOs?

“During the 18 years I served in the Senate, Republicans often disagreed with each other. But there was much that held us together. We believed in limited government, in keeping light the burden of taxation and regulation. We encouraged the private sector, so that a free economy might thrive. We believed that judges should interpret the law, not legislate. We were internationalists who supported an engaged foreign policy, a strong national defense and free trade. These were principles shared by virtually all Republicans. But in recent times, we Republicans have allowed this shared agenda to become secondary to the agenda of Christian conservatives. As a senator, I worried every day about the size of the federal deficit. I did not spend a single minute worrying about the effect of gays on the institution of marriage. Today it seems to be the other way around.” — John Danforth, moderate Republican and former U.S. Senator and ambassador.

Is this the turning of the tide? Is this the comment that finally strikes at the heart of the evangelical Christian camels who have infiltrated the Big Tent?

I've long placed the blame on Karl Rove for his master strategems and his overplaying of niche manipulation. He's the one whose campaign tricks have made the Christian Right feel that it is more central to Republicanism than it actually is. But I have not been willing up to this point to place blame on the President, primarily because of his righteousness on Iraq and the War on Terror. But I think I'm coming around to a more concrete sense that his agenda is less secular than it seems and that his steadfast refusal to veto any appropriations from Congress is a serious problem.

It's not so important that Republicans get their way as it is that the nation is run properly, and now is the time for all good Republicans to look to the health of the nation. Bush's domestic agenda has been crippled since birth with a singular inability to manage sprawling bureacracies with vision or discipline, and while neocons like myself have been searching the horizon for signs of progress, few things seem to have been going well domestically.

Since I fundamentally believe that life is like a crap sandwich (the more bread you have, the easier the crap goes down), I haven't sweated the domestic agenda. But I'm trying to think hard about what it is that GWBush has done for the country, as opposed to the national interest on the world stage, and I'm coming up blank. So I think that I am returning back to the kind of skepticism I had back in '03. The little things are starting to add up, starting with Plame.

GWBush may be the president that proves that if you don't mind bankrupting the country, there's little that America can't accomplish. Is that going to be the cost of putting AQ down? It better not be, and I see dark economic clouds on the horizon.

And while these economic worries are at the front of my concerns, I'm starting to think that perhaps this Miers nomination is more than it appears to be. The word today is that she's against all sorts of abortions. Whether or not it should be, it's going to be the handle on which her nomination swings and I can clearly see GWB running this nomination train straight into a brick wall.

So the question is whether this Bush understands where the soul of America is, and what kind of Christianity is the Christianity of this Christian nation. It's the Christianity of Christmas. The Christianity of Norman Rockwell and a moment of silence. It's the Christianity of the 'C' in YMCA. It's not the Evangelical Christianity of those awaiting the Rapture or those of the Chick tracts. It's not the Christianity of Operation Rescue, and like it or not, it is not the Christianity of political opportunity. So I have to ask very seriously if this president sees himself as the leader of the Republican Party or of a Born Again Nation, because a lot of us are not ready to blur the line between Church and State. Not for anyone under any circumstances. If it is faith that's calling the shots in the White House, then maybe we have to go back to pre-Kennedy skepticism.

I understand and respect that George W. Bush has a good heart. That's not enough. I understand and respect that he has his priorities in the right place, but he clearly is not managing effectively, and the shortcuts and favors he seems to be cutting for people is starting to smell to me like something other than incompetence. Bush has done everything I have needed him to do as President except resolve the Plame mystery. Now he's got to be on the defensive with me as regards the economy, his responsibility in pandering to a loud minority Christian sect, and the effectiveness of his domestic agencies.

Here's the score:

EPA: C
Homeland Security: D
Interior: C
Defense: B
Health & Human Services: Fail
Federal Reserve & Treasury: B+
Energy: C-
Transporation: Who?
State: B+
HUD: Who?
Education: C
Commerce: Who?
Iraq: B+
Trade Deficit: D
Veteran's Affairs: B
Agriculture: B

That's not good. It's adequate. But my priorities have not been domestic. Now I'm turning that way and it doesn't look good for this crop of Republicans. The more happy evangelicals are with their influence on the GOP, the less happy I am.

A Million Tiny Daggers

I heard there was a large Farrakhan event a few days ago. I didn't get the memo.

More precisely, I haven't been through the 'hood in several weeks so I hadn't been informed of the matter. I can't say that I listen to any black radio seeing as I own all the music I want to hear. As for BET, well I was gone around the time of Donnie Simpson. So how does Farrakhan get half a million people to congregate in one place? It ain't magic, it's logistics. And apparently, it is a logistical miracle that passes some of us by. Needless to say, the event went off without a hitch - a hitch being arrests and violence sufficient to spice up whatever ordinary distortions get covered by the media.

The good thing about Farrakhan is that he knows when to show up, which is rarely. But every time he does, it makes a big splash. You got to give the man some props for that. As much as people like to blast Farrakhan as an anti-Semitic blowhard, he has never crossed the line and broke the law. The Nation of Islam always gets busted for what its lunatics do, be they Khallid Abdul Muhammad or Tony Muhammad. But Farrakhan remains in the calm eye of the storm, somehow at peace with his complicity in the death of Malcolm X, and yet at a safe distance from the madness of some loud fraction of his clerics. Like other conservatives before me, I occasionally feel a strong resonance with Farrakhan's message of die hard self-reliance. He's a black separatist, pure and simple. He doesn't believe in integration, nor does he believe in superiority. Rather, he represents the evolution of survivalism. But instead of being in the backwoods like white survivalists, he's deep in the urban ghettos, jails and prisons with black survivalists. He is at peace with permanent non-violent conflict between the races, but unlike those at the fringe, Farrakhan always says, "I don't want to fight you, just get out of my face." Of course he knows better. There are plenty of Americans who would volunteer to have Farrakhan deported or worse for no good reason. Louie may occasionally be screwy but he ain't stupid. You'll never hear him singing 'I fought the law and the law won.' He knows which battles to engage.

There aren't many if any prominent Muslim clerics we Americans know in America which is a shame. So Farrakhan takes the heat from all black muslims although most American blacks are Sunni - which tends to be more modern and less conservative than Shia, from what I've learned. Still, for all the extraordinary venom and fire that has come from this brand of radical talk, there has been very little violence directed at 'devils'. It doesn't take long to hear some taste of the nasty vibe when listening to Ice Cube's NOI tinged opus 'Lethal Injection'. You'd think that a million fans of that million seller album would be a nightmare black American jihad waiting to explode. But American taste for violent themes far outstrips our willingness to go there and so it holds for "the followers of Farrakhan / Don't tell me that you understand / Until you hear the man", as Chuck D said.

I've had several friends in the Nation, and it isn't a cult. It's more like a religion where you go to church every day. In the NOI, they watch each other every day all the time. A brother like me would suffocate within a week. But if you buy the premise, that nobody, especially white Christians, has the interests of blackfolks at heart except blackfolks and that American Christianity is corrupt beyond redemption, then you could do worse than the NOI, especially if you're a prisoner.

The Nation has a surfiet of flaws that escapes nobody's attention. There isn't a mistake they've made that hasn't found its way to publication thanks to the surveillance of various watchdogs. It's nice to know that while he's not dismissable, he has been dismissed. How many years have I had to answer for him? More than I care to remember. Admittedly the blogosphere is a more sophisticated space, and the Culture Wars have calmed down significantly as well. So it's been a while since I've had to whip out the disclaimer. So in that context, it's useful and interesting to see what the presence of Louis Farrakhan augers for black politics. He's the one with the organization that brings the bodies.

I'll be keeping my ears open for inflections in black politics owing to Farrakhan's words. I don't expect much, but I'm still listening.

It's Only Baseball

Bono's Double Standard

Check this out:

The Irish rock star, Bono, has been angered by Senator Hillary Clinton’s use of a U2 concert this week to raise funds for her political campaign coffers—even though he is a good friend of her husband, Bill.

“U2 concerts are categorically not fund-raisers for any politician. They are rock concerts for U2 fans,” said his close associate, Jamie Drummond, who runs Data, the Third World advocacy group set up by Bono with Sir Bob Geldof.

“If any political fund-raising events take place at a U2 concert, it is without the involvement or knowledge of Data, U2 or Bono.”

Mrs Clinton, the frontrunner to be the Democrat candidate for the White House in 2008, is charging 18 guests $2,500 (£1,400) a head to join her in a luxury box for the sold out show in Washington on Wednesday. Despite U2’s public criticism, she is pressing on with the fund-raiser, which will bring in $45,000 for an outlay of about $7,000 on the box, and her staff are unapologetic.

So let me see if I have this right, if you make millions with lyrics like "There are no Russians and there ain't no yanks / Just corporate criminals playing with tanks."; then your concerts can't possibly be a place for politics? When in life have I ever heard anything so hypocritical? Never.

I couldn't invent this.

Oh God I hope this becomes a trend. What I wouldn't give to see some political opportunism become so wedded to Hollywood that actors start saying things like "Hey I'm just entertainer, I don't want to be involved with party politics in any way." It would be a dream come true. And to think, it took somebody like Hillary Clinton, the scapegoat of first resort, to kick it off. I watch people burst blood vessels over Clinton with bemused befuddlement, but this has got to be the first time I really like what she's done.

Crank up the volume. Garafolo standup is next.

A Little Smacking of Cornel West

Cornel West wrote 'Unmasking the Black Conservatives' in 1986. In looking for online literature, I came across it. Interesting.

The importance of this quest for middle-class respectability based on merit rather than politics cannot be overestimated in the new black conservatism. The need of black conservatives to gain the respect of their white peers deeply shapes certain elements of their conservatism. In this regard, they simply want what most Americans want -- to be judged by the quality of their skills, not the color of their skin. But surprisingly, the black conservatives overlook the fact that affirmative action policies were political responses to the pervasive refusal of most white Americans to judge black Americans on that basis.

Firstly, I think that those folks I call 'Carbon Copy Conservatives', although I can't say that I know any personally, are doing exactly what West says they don't - which is seeking acceptance with white peers strictly on the bases of party affiliation. This is exactly what Condi Rice was accused of. Liberal critics of Rice suggested that she was a parrot and that it didn't matter what her skills were that she was in the White House to do the bidding of GWBush because her politics which were indistinguishable from that of white Republicans.

I think that there is an honest contingent of black Conservatives who are conservative in ways indistinguishable from their white colleagues who rightly take pride in party partisanship.

Nobody overlooks that fact that Affirmative Action helped lots of blackfolks, it's simply discounted. Even though West's article is 19 years old, it's fascinating in how centrally it locates the matter of Affirmative Action as a point of contention.

The new black conservatives assume that without affirmative action programs, white Americans will make choices on merit rather than on race. Yet they have adduced absolutely no evidence for this: Hence, they are either politically naïve or simply unconcerned about black mobility. Most Americans realize that job-hiring choices are made both on reasons of merit and on personal grounds. And it is this personal dimension that is often influenced by racist perceptions. Therefore the pertinent debate regarding black hiring is never "merit vs. race" but whether hiring decisions will be based on merit, influenced by race-bias against blacks, or on merit, influenced by race-bias, but with special consideration for minorities as mandated by law. In light of actual employment practices, the black conservative rhetoric about race-free hiring criteria (usually coupled with a call for dismantling affirmative action mechanisms) does no more than justify actual practices of racial discrimination. Their claims about self-respect should not obscure this fact, nor should they be regarded as different from the normal self-doubts and insecurities of new arrivals in the American middle class. It is worth noting that most of the new black conservatives are first-generation middleclass persons, who offer themselves as examples of how well the system works for those willing to sacrifice and work hard. Yet, in familiar American fashion, genuine white peer acceptance still seems to escape them. In this regard, they are still influenced by white racism.

This is so loaded that it's difficult to know where to start. I'd simply suggest that West's entire article be examined with the benefit of almost 20 years of hindsight. What's astounding to me is the extent to which he's correct about the failures of black liberal politics to deal with the change in the global economy, and how much that global economy, especially in my field of IT has pretty much demolished the white racist middleclass barriers to entry.

I would be quite happy to see some study which might tell us what effect a regime of Affirmative Action has had on the attitudes within the targetted industry on black employment. I would suspect that the overall effect would be positive. What needs to be disambiguated however, is the effect of actual black success vs the ethos of equal opportunity. That is to say, in the US Armed Forces, how much of the relative ease with which black are accepted into the ranks is due to black power established within the organization (presumeably from Affirmative Action but not necessarily) vs white liberal guilt (for lack of a better term) vs pure colorblind merit?

My gut tells me that black power and personality is the greatest influence. Moreover, I am convinced that once established the question of Affirmative Action stigma becomes moot. There is an interesting kind of tokenism at work that is not necessarily bad. Just as Michelle Wie gets a shot at being 'the next Tiger Woods', a sterling example of minority breakthrough can be positively influential on expectations of succeeding generations. The important thing to note is that Affirmative Action is not necessary to accomplish this, but black excellence is. Once black excellence has been established it is it's own 'affirmative action', one completely devoid of the political backlash actual Affirmative Action created.

In the end I think how you fall out on this depends upon what proclivities you assign to whitefolks. To suggest that might be a fixed relationship or dominated by some hegemony is a grave error. It is the error West makes and it is why his focus on white racism has done little to address the economic problems facing blackfolks.

West goes on to say this:

My aim is not to provide excuses for black behavior or to absolve blacks of personal responsibility. But when the new black conservatives accent black behavior and responsibility in such a way that the cultural realities of black people are ignored, they are playing ‘a deceptive and dangerous intellectual game with the lives and fortunes of disadvantaged people. We indeed must criticize and condemn immoral acts of black people, but we must do so cognizant of the circumstances into which people are born and under which they live. By overlooking this, the new black conservatives fall into the trap of blaming black poor people for their predicament.

What's the first thing that pops into mind? Cosby. Black Conservatives are saying that Cosby is right, and moreover that Moynihan was right. What are the 'circumstances into which people are born and under which they live' which tells them Marriage is not a reasonable choice? This takes us back through Bennett to the rather uncontested assertions of Stephen J. Levitt:

Race is not an important part of the abortion-crime argument that John Donohue and I have made in academic papers and that Dubner and I discuss in Freakonomics. It is true that, on average, crime involvement in the U.S. is higher among blacks than whites. Importantly, however, once you control for income, the likelihood of growing up in a female-headed household, having a teenage mother, and how urban the environment is, the importance of race disappears for all crimes except homicide. (The homicide gap is partly explained by crack markets). In other words, for most crimes a white person and a black person who grow up next door to each other with similar incomes and the same family structure would be predicted to have the same crime involvement. Empirically, what matters is the fact that abortions are disproportionately used on unwanted pregnancies, and disproportionately by teenage women and single women.

(emphasis mine)

In other words, outside of crack and murder Moynihan was right, and Black Conservatives are right to criticize this moral failure not just in black communities but as a general principle that applies equally to whites.

No Black Conservatism: What the Wiki?

It turns out that until today, there was no entry in Wikipedia for 'Black Conservatism'. Imagine that. So I've gone ahead and started it. Hold on to your hats.

I'm sending out a blast today to get everybody jumping on it. I'm interested to hear all kinds of reasonable and some unreasonable reactions to what Black Conservatism is all about. Partially to reckon with the perceptions of other conservatives with black conservatives as well as those of blacks who are not conservative themselves. Start here.

How do you define Black Conservatism?

Thoughtless Crap for Fun

I am: 88% Republican.

"You listen to a lot of AM talk radio, don't you?"

Are You A Republican?

Shepherd: It Figures

You scored as Shepherd Derrial Book. The Preacher. Out here, folks need a minister, if only to remind them that God hasn't forgotten them. It isn't about making them worship, it is teaching them to do right by themselves and other people. Why is that so hard for some to understand? Shepherd Derrial Book 88% Zoe Alleyne Washburne 75% Simon Tam 75% Capt. Mal Reynolds 69% Kaylee Frye 63% River Tam 63% Inara Serra 50% The Operative 50% Jayne Cobb 44% Hoban 'Wash' Washburne 38% Which Serenity character are you? created with QuizFarm.com

Domino

Tony Scott's latest film, Domino, is a disappointment. Maybe it's because I fell asleep too many times and missed the details that would have kept me into the film. In fact, I'm pretty sure of that and that it has something to do with a baby. Like most action flicks, this one had a killer trailer. I had every expectation that this was going to a smashing film. Instead it got bogged down as a failed poser flick mired in the wasteland halfway between 'Natural Born Killers' and 'Lock, Stock & Two Smoking Barrels'. It looks good, and has its moments, but those moments are not enough to get one through the twisty narrative. Somehow it just doesn't work. I can see Scott's torture. He's got scenes that are so pulverizingly gritty and close-ups on Mickey Rourke and his costars that are so compellingly delicious that it's almost impossible to want to cut them. And so at an overlong two hours, you have a pile of hardcore music and video, that alternatively pumps up the adrenaline and then abruptly switches gears leaving you nowhere. The pace of the film is jerky, like the camera and the colors and the music - but that's what we expect from Scott and he's in good form here. We get Mickey Rourke in full on degeneracy and nasty hotness from Keira Knightly. We get Delroy Lindo doing Delroy Lindo which is always a treat, but we don't have any bad guys. Or at least we don't seem to have any baddies that make us want to root for the relatively un-bad guys. But maybe I fell asleep on that part too. Either way, you've got to see it on the big screen, because like Sin City, it's about the visual experience. Take it to the next stage Scott. Make an opera.