Conservative Bush supporters harbor "stronger" prejudices than do Liberals.

While it is not shocking or surprising to Black Introspection, a study that was completed recently results concludes that those who support Bush harbor greater resentment and prejudices towards Black men and women. This is something we have argued and put forth much to dismay of our Bush supporting Black family members who sing the praises of Bush and Republican Conservatism in general.

The study “explored relationships between racial bias and political affiliation by analyzing self-reported beliefs, voting patterns and the results of psychological tests that measure implicit attitudes -- subtle stereotypes people hold about various groups.” And the results were “supporters of President Bush and other conservatives had stronger self-admitted and implicit biases against blacks than liberals did.

It should not be missed that this report states Conservatives had “stronger” self admitted biases against Black men and women than do Liberals, not that white liberals are free of these biases, it is just that conservatives biases are stronger. This to me is as important as the already known revelation that Conservatives really don’t like Black folk. White Liberal compassion represents the white person who said after a Black man was lynched he should not be left just hanging there, cut him down, while the conservative wanted to leave the Black man hanging from a tree, Neither of them were opposed to him being murdered.

The study also reports that

“Americans, liberals and conservatives, found it more difficult to associate black faces with positive concepts than white faces -- evidence of implicit bias.”

This is the mindset from which most law enforcement personnel operate and a consequence of it is racial profiling and the ever popular driving while Black. This is also what causes juries and judges to be harsher on a Black defendant than a white defendant. When one is unable to see themselves in those over whom they have been positioned to judge, their judgment will always be one skewed with their own biases and affinities that too often works to the detriment of Black men and women.


Of course conservatives are questioning the political motives of those who did the study, being that they have been donors to Democrats in the past. It would be great if the Republicans used my argument in that the study only states republicans have stronger biases and prejudices than do Liberals not that Liberals do not suffer from the same kind of white supremacy mindset as the republicans. I will be waiting a long time for that to happen.

PBS Black History month Programs

As we did last year, Black Introspection is again posting the information about PBS yearly tribute to Black History during the month of February. This year they have five new programs that will be airing and encore presentations of many of the programs from last year. The program that seem to be getting the most publicity is the four part seiries African American Lives hosted by Henry Louis gates where in he seeks to explore the family tree of prominent Black men and women in America from Oprah, TD. Jakes to Chris Tucker.
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PBS TO OFFER SPECIAL PROGRAMMING FOR BLACK HISTORY MONTH

February 1 – February 28, 2006



Alexandria, VA - January 25, 2006 - From history to culture to drama to independent film, PBS features year-round programming both created by and about African Americans. In honor of Black History Month, PBS will broadcast a variety of new and encore presentations that celebrate the rich history of African Americans. The centerpiece for this month of special programs is a four-hour series by Henry Louis Gates, Jr., which uses genealogy and DNA science to trace the roots of a group of African-American citizens back through American history to Africa.

Other program topics include a look at the little-known founders of the Black Panthers movement, and an examination of a three-night riot that took place in July 1964 in Rochester, New York, which tore the city apart and from which it has never recovered. THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MISS JANE PITTMAN, the nine-time Emmy Award-winning television movie starring Cicely Tyson (with a new introduction from Queen Latifah), will also be shown. With a breadth and depth that can't be found anywhere else on television, these compelling programs examine the cultural contributions and distinguished heritage of African Americans.

Broadcast Premieres

AFRICAN AMERICAN LIVES (New)
Wednesdays, February 1- 8, 9:00-11:00 p.m. ET
Renowned scholar Dr. Henry Louis Gates Jr., W.E.B. DuBois professor of the Humanities and chair of African and African-American Studies at Harvard University, takes Alex Haley's Roots saga to a whole new level. Using genealogy and DNA science, Dr. Gates tells the personal stories of eight accomplished African Americans - a neurosurgeon, a TV pioneer/philanthropist, an astronaut, a music entrepreneur, a sociologist, a movie star, a minister and a comedian - tracing their roots through American history and back to Africa.

INDEPENDENT LENS
"Negroes With Guns: Rob Williams and Black Power" (New)
Tuesday, February 7, 10:00-11:00 p.m. ET (check local listings)
Credited with inspiring the Black Power movement, Robert Williams led his North Carolina hometown to defend itself against the Ku Klux Klan and challenge repressive Jim Crow laws. "Negroes With Guns" follows Williams' journey from southern community leader to exile in Cuba and China, a journey that brought the issue of armed self-defense to the forefront of the Civil Rights Movement.

INDEPENDENT LENS
"July '64" (New)
Tuesday, February 14, 10:00-11:00 p.m. ET (check local listings)
In the summer of 1964, a three-night riot erupted in two predominantly black neighborhoods in downtown Rochester, New York, the culmination of decades of poverty, joblessness and racial discrimination - and a significant event in the Civil Rights era. Using archival footage and interviews with those who were present, "July '64" explores the genesis and outcome of these three devastating nights.

FANNIE LOU HAMER: COURAGE AND FAITH (New)
February 2006 (check local listings)
Using archival footage and interviews with those who knew her well and were affected by her actions, this program chronicles the extraordinary life of Fannie Lou Hamer and introduces her to a new, younger generation. Mrs. Hamer attended the 1964 Democratic National Convention as a member of the Mississippi Democratic Freedom Party and challenged the all-white Mississippi delegation. Many credit her presence at the convention as the impetus for the passage of the 1965 Voting Rights Act. Interviews include Congresswoman Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC); Dorothy Height, president of the National Council of Negro Women; Rutgers University history professor Clement Price; and numerous members of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party. Bernice Johnson Reagon, founder of Sweet Honey in the Rock, narrates.

SHARED HISTORY (New)
February 2006 (check local listings)
SHARED HISTORY is the intimate story of the relationship between two families whose connection was forged in slavery and has endured to the present. The filmmaker, the great-great-granddaughter of a slave owner, and Rhonda Kearse, a descendant of one of the enslaved families, seek to understand and reconcile the reality of slavery with the shared lives and affections between the families.

Encore Presentations

AMERICA BEYOND THE COLOR LINE WITH HENRY LOUIS GATES, JR. (Encore)
February 2006 (check local listing)
Henry Louis Gates Jr., Harvard's chair of African-American Studies, travels the length and breadth of the United States to take the temperature of black America at the start of the new century. In four programs, Gates travels to four different parts of America - the East Coast, the deep South, inner-city Chicago and Hollywood. He explores this rich and diverse landscape, social as well as geographic, and meets the people who are defining black America, from the most famous and influential to those at the grassroots.

THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF MISS JANE PITTMAN (Encore)
February 2006 (check local listings)
PBS presents a rebroadcast of this groundbreaking nine-time Emmy Award-winning television movie from the 1970s. Based on the best-selling novel by Ernest J. Gaines, the fictionalized historical drama from director John Korty follows 110-year-old Jane Pittman, played by Cicely Tyson, on her incredible life journey from the end of the Civil War in the 1860s through the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s. Through the years, Miss Jane survives the last vestiges of slavery in Louisiana, Jim Crow laws, encounters with the KKK and the slaying of her husband, only to triumph in the end over social injustice. The broadcast includes an introductory segment hosted by Queen Latifah.

THE BLACK PRESS: SOLDIERS WITHOUT SWORDS (Encore)
February 2006 (check local listings)
This special is the first documentary to provide an in-depth examination of the history and contributions of African-American newspapers. Since the early 1800s, black newspapers have existed in almost every major city in the United States. THE BLACK PRESS: SOLDIERS WITHOUT SWORDS gives life to this fascinating, little-known history by weaving interviews with editors, photographers and journalists of the black press with archival footage, photographs and the music of Grammy Award-winning jazz artist Ron Carter. Stage, screen and television actor Joe Morton narrates the film.

BRIARS IN THE COTTON PATCH: THE STORY OF KOINONIA FARM (Encore)
February 2006 (check local listings)
This program explores the unknown story of Koinonia Farm, which may have been the most daring social experiment in the South during the last century. Blacks and whites lived together on the Georgia farm, broke bread at the same table and were paid the same wages. The commune, started in 1942, became the target of white anger - with bombs, boycotts and shootings. Out of this violent history grew the worldwide movement of Habitat for Humanity International. Former UN Ambassador Andrew Young hosts.

INDEPENDENT LENS
"A Place of Our Own" (Encore)
February 2006 (check local listings)
Stanley Nelson is a third-generation upper middle-class African American who spent the past 40 summers in Oak Bluffs, an affluent African-American resort community on Martha's Vineyard. Building on personal stories of summers past, "A Place of Our Own" explores the world of black doctors, lawyers and journalists who created social clubs, professional organizations and a refuge for African Americans.

P.O.V.
"Chisholm '72 - Unbought & Unbossed" (Encore)
February 2006 (check local listings) This documentary recaptures the times and spirit of a watershed event in American politics, when Shirley Chisholm, an African-American woman, dared to take an equal place on the presidential dais. The New York Democratic congresswoman's bid engendered strong and sometimes bigoted opposition, setting off currents that affect American politics and social perceptions to this day.

SLAVERY AND THE MAKING OF AMERICA (Encore)
February 2006 (check local listings)
This groundbreaking series chronicles the institution of American slavery from its origins in 1619 - when English settlers in Virginia purchased 20 Africans from Dutch traders - through the arrival of the first 11 slaves in the northern colonies (in Dutch New Amsterdam), the American Revolution, the Civil War, the adoption of the 13th Amendment and Reconstruction. With such unprecedented breadth come entirely new perspectives on and facts about slavery. These new perspectives challenge many long-held notions (such as the idea that slavery was strictly a southern institution; it was, in fact, a national institution) and highlight the contradictions of a country that was founded on the principle of "liberty and justice for all" but embraced slavery. Morgan Freeman narrates.

THIS FAR BY FAITH: AFRICAN-AMERICAN SPIRITUAL JOURNEYS (Encore)
February 2006 (check local listings)
In six hours of powerful storytelling, THIS FAR BY FAITH examines the African-American religious experience through the last three centuries. From the arrival of the early African slaves through the Civil War, reconstruction, Jim Crow, the great depression, the civil rights era and into the 21st century, the series explores the connections between faith and the development of African-American cultural values. Lorraine Toussaint ("Any Day Now," "Crossing Jordan") narrates.

PBS is a private, nonprofit media enterprise that serves the nation's 348 public noncommercial television stations, reaching nearly 90 million people each week through on-air and online content. Bringing diverse viewpoints to television and the Internet, PBS provides high-quality documentary and dramatic entertainment, and consistently dominates the most prestigious award competitions. PBS is the leading provider of educational materials for K-12 teachers, and offers a broad array of educational services for adult learners. PBS' premier kids' TV programming and Web site, PBS KIDS Online pbskids.org continue to be parents' and teachers' most trusted learning environments for children. More information about PBS is available at pbs.org one of the leading dot-org Web sites on the Internet. PBS is headquartered in Alexandria, Virginia.

-PBS-

CONTACT: Cara White, 843/881-1480; carapub@aol.com

Whatever happened to MANHOOD?

Whatever happened to the concepts of honor and manhood? Indeed, a male cannot achieve the title of “Man” without having the character of honor, so the two concepts go hand in hand. The concept and practice of manhood and honor seems to be in decline as young males now see being “hard” or a person without conscious as the highest valued behavior trait in the male culture.

It needs to be made perfectly clear to youth that it takes much more strength to be a man, than it does to be hard and without conscious. The ultimate label of respect is to call a male a “Man” and one becomes a man through the manifestation of the rights of passage into manhood, by the demonstration of character and not age. Simply turning 18 or getting hair on your face and chest does not make one a man and neither does shooting someone or the willingness to shoot someone whom you have a beef with.


What it means to be strong and to be a man has gotten terribly off track in regards to the true working definition. People who are actually weak have managed to redefine manhood and strength so that they can appear strong when they otherwise would have be seen as weak using the traditional definition. The street culture, which some call the thug culture, has managed to turn their behavior into the template for behaviorism for those aspiring to be strong and men.

The violence taking place in our streets and communities is not the actions of the strong or that of men. When individuals must take advantage of the element of surprise, stealth, superior weapons, size or some other means, you are not behaving as a man. Drive by shootings, home invasions, robberies, rape and other forms of violence are not acts of people who are strong, but behaviorally are acts of those who are weak and afraid to give their opponent or target an equal opportunity to defend themselves. Without this advantage, many, if not most of these individuals would be too afraid to act because the benefit cost analysis puts them at too much risk.

If one is a gang banger and has a beef with another gang, instead of doing a “drive by” instead have a dual, with armaments of your choice, say 45’s. Find an unpopulated place, stair each other directly in the eye and draw and fire. That’s what men would do. If you want to do a home invasion, tell the occupants when you will be coming and what type of weapons you have, so that they can be prepared. That’s what men would do. All this sissified stealth attacks are not honorable and not the act of real men. If you would not attempt it without the advantage, then you are acting cowardly and not passing the rights of passage into manhood.

When a male is only motivated to act when he has the advantage, then he is being weak. If what you desire is really of worth then you will fight for it like a man regardless of whether or not you have an advantage. Men are not advantage takers. They do not take advantage over other males and they do not take advantage over females, notwithstanding the fact that they often have it and could. There in lies one of the key rights of passage into manhood, which is the ability to control the self and restrain impulses from opportunities. If a male cannot practice self control or impulse control, he cannot be classified as a man. Men act off of principles and rules of honor and will not act based upon advantage and opportunity, which means that a true men will act even at a disadvantage.

Strength is the ability to manifest control physically and mentally and it takes more strength to control oneself than to control others through advantage. Infants have a hard time practicing impulse control over the self and hence adult males who have the same problem are behaving more like children than men. Chris Rock once said that a man is only as faithfull as his opportunities. In other words, fidelity in males is driven by opportunities for infidelity. Well, if that is true, then most males are not being men. It takes much more strength to forgo temptation than to succumb to it. Therefore, the definition of “man” should be reserved for the highest demonstration of strength in males, not the lowest.

The committed family man is the highest manifestation of strength in males, bar none. To be a committed family man dedicated to providing for and protecting a women and children and forgoing opportunities and temptations, is a strong as a male can get. Many men do not commit out of the fear that they will be hurt emotionally. Many men fear their emotions to the degree that they will not let a woman in their hearts and make them feel vulnerable. This is especially true of men who have been hurt emotionally by women in the past and many of these males take it out on other women by never committing or opening up emotionally. That’s not an act of strength on the part of males, but rather, actions constrained by fear, which is cowardly.

Even our nation, which is dominated and run by males, does not embody manhood. Recently, our nation has gone to war with other nations, ONLY when we have a clear advantage, which is not the practice of manhood. To drop bombs down from planes flying at 30,000 feet or from ships far away in the sea, is the act of power, but not the human manifestation of bravery, strength and manhood. Terrorist are often called cowards, but it’s hard to argue that the man in the advanced Abrams Tank is braver than his opponent on horse back with a sword. The fact that the person on horse back decides to find an asymmetrical way of doing battle is only because the person in the Tank will not get on horseback to do battle man to man.

In conclusion, in our society has become really twisted. People who are actually behaving the strongest and manliest are seen as weak and those behaving weak have the power and influence to define it as strong. I don’t know how any of this will change and I really don’t know for sure how it all got so twisted. All I know is that it is indeed…..twisted.

TIME IS THE TRUE OPPONENT OF CAPITALISM

I want to talk a little bit about economics. I am not an economist, but I did spend several nights at a Holiday Inn Express, if that counts as a substitute. More precisely, I would like to talk about the economic system of capitalism and many of the misconceptions I hear being bantered around by people who like to think that they know enough about economics to talk intelligently about it.

One of the common misconceptions is that a critique of capitalism is, by implication, an advocacy for socialism, communism or Marxism, take your pick or chose all of the above. The nearly ubiquitous response to defenders of the capitalistic system is to point out the empirical evidence of failure of socialism, Marxism and or communism. However, the failure of the practice or implementation of these other systems is not proof of theoretical failure of the model, but possible failure of management. Businesses fail under capitalism all the time due to poor management…but few interpret the failures to be failure of the theoretical model of capitalism. That having been said, I am not advocating these other systems over capitalism

The ubiquitous juxtaposition of Capitalism in rivalry with other forms of economic systems is an intentional or unintentional obfuscation. People talk about Capitalism as if the primary opponent of the system is other systems in existence. It’s talked about like a sporting event. The Capitalist vs the Socialist or Communist and whoever is left standing at a particular point in time is deemed the victor. Thus, the fact that so many Communist or Socialist nations have failed leaves the impression that Capitalism is the clear victor as it is the last man standing strong. There in lies the biggest fallacy of them all, for the failures of others do not imply your success, unless the others are your true opponent or impediment to success, which is not the case in economics.

At the risk of sounding philosophical, the primary opponent of entities in existence is not other entities in existence contemporaneously, but time. Time is the ultimate opponent of all systems, including economic systems, due to entropy and the law of thermodynamics. Therefore, noting the failures of controlled economies deemed socialist or communist, while capitalism is still standing strong, does not therefore mean that capitalism will not also eventually implode from its merits. Thus, the ultimate measure of superiority, giving that time is the primary opponent in life, is not where something ranks at a point in time, but its ability to sustain itself over time. Capitalism, by its nature is expansive and hyper consumptive, which is unsustainable given that it is dependent upon finite resources.

Think of it like this. Take the lives of two different individuals. One has lived to be of old age, acquired considerable wealth and led an economically productive life, but did not reproduce any children. The other lived a short life hard life, was not economically that productive, but fathered seven children. Who was more successful? By the standards of nature, the latter individual was by far more successful because his actions will propagate his DNA to the future generations, thus ensuring the survival of his bloodline. The former individual, despite all his economic success and wealth is a failure by nature standards because his actions cannot transcend his existence over time, through DNA. That is why the primary objective of all forms of life is reproduction because reproduction allows species to sustain its existence over time and defy entropy.

Now, back to the economic system of capitalism, no matter how much wealth and gluttony it produces, if it cannot stand the test of time it’s doomed to be a failed system, just as the others. The long known secret and key to life is moderation. Capitalism, however, fuels itself from greed, gluttony and unrestraint. It is the opportunity to get egregiously rich which fuels the behavioral motivation component of the system, as economics is more of a behavioral science than it is an exact science. Consequently, the only way to achieve moderation in capitalism is through government regulation or interference in the free market. The free market will not regulate resources via price constraints until they become scarce and near exhaustion and by that time it’s too late when you are talking resources like Finite fossil fuels. Future generations will not have them to exploit to create the type of consumption and production that created the success and wealth in of the system.

The concept of moderation is the key to sustainability over time. If one wants to be able to run a long time, one will have to practice self restraint and pace onesself so that so as to not burnout too quickly, notwithstanding the fact that one can go much faster. In order to achieve this pace of moderation, regulation of your muscles by conscious thought (the government of your body) must take place. Capitalism cannot do this because regulation and conservation impedes the free market and the more you regulate and conserve by government mandate the less you are practicing free market capitalism.

In conclusion, capitalism needs to be analyzed, and criticized when warranted, with respect to the test of time and not measured against the failures of other systems. Capitalism cannot sustain itself. If it is true that the standard of living of the Global West is based upon the practice of capitalism, then the ubiquitous spread of the model throughout the world should replicate the massive production and consumption levels across the planet. I doubt very seriously that the finite energy resources that fuel modernity can sustain this hyper consumption levels across the globe. Before long, resource wars would result in the destruction of nations as economy's and lively hoods would be dependent upon diminishing reserves of energy resources, increasing tension and conflicts. Capitalism’s dependency on cheap oil to fuel it will not be seamlessly reinvented out of either, without a radical global depression brought about via resource depletion and wars.

Capitalism ulitimate savior will be moderation by government mandates....which will mean that its savior will be its behaving more socialist or communist like in regulating and controling markets. In other words, the salvation of people living under capitalism, when the system implodes, will be manifesting less capitalism.

Nothing new under the sun.

In blogshere and the world of internet forums, there is no ideology or group in America less tolerant than the white conservative. The white conservative squashes dissent via banishment and deletion of dissenters from their web pages in cyberspace. There is no practice of the constitutional virtues that supposedly makes this nation so great even though white conservatives think they embody patriotism and love of these national principles. When they create their own little countries in cyberspace they are authoritarian and dictatorial in nature and one can’t help but to conclude that had they a real country to run that it would be run the same way…kind of like Saddam ran his show.

I have probably visited more than 50 conservative blogs and forums in the last 5 years. I seek out challenges to my point of view more than I seek people who will simply agree with it, with the goal of always migrating to the greater truth. Thats how I grow confident in my position....because its an evolution towards the greatest truth. What I experienced from white conservatives was nearly ubiquitous. Almost all of the conservative oriented blogs and forums banned me and or deleted my posts. They did not want to have their positions challenged, especially, if not exclusively, when the topic or issue was linked or associated with race.

You may erroneously think that nothing irks the white conservative more than the liberal, but liberalism is only the proxy for what really irks the white conservative. Race in general and black folks in particular and the idea of the government attempting to alleviate the effects from centuries of white racism, is what really agitates white folk. You can visit their blogs and debate liberalism all day, to their enjoyment, but as soon as the trojan horse of anti-liberalism is dissected to reveal an anti-black core of race they feel exposed and threatened and seek to destroy the threat via first attacking the messenger then ultimately deleting, locking or banning your IP address from their site.

It does not take a rocket scientist to figure out that white conservatives utterly lack confidence in their position. One only tries to destroy or ban those things that are feared as threats. When what are feared are simply words, the pen becomes mightier than the AK-47. If the conservative was truly confident in his words and their ability to represent truth and logic and defeat the words of dissenters, there would be no need to resort to such tactics as banning and deletion of dissenting points of view. In other words, the white conservatives are simply cowards who all huddle up in their little conservative Kingdoms in cyberspace where they crush dissent to their ruling opinion. They are simply waiting for the day that they can manifest their cyber kingdom in the real world, harking back to the days when black folks were scared to look them in the eye….lest they be punished.

Many black conservative dissenters criticize me based upon their perception that I am overly consumed with what white folks are doing and thinking and not enough about what black folks are doing and thinking. However, who actually thinks that if the Africans actually knew what European folks were planning and thinking, concerning black people, that they would have embraced whites as trading partners for black captives? If the African had understood the white man better….maybe the last 300 years of slavery and colonization would not have taken place against the African people. Moreover, nothing creates unity more than a common enemy or threat and had Africans realized that whites were a bigger threat to them than their historical black tribal enemies, history would have to be rewritten. Africans would likely have reduced warfare with each and banned together to repel the threat to all of their lands and existence posed by greedy whites.

In light of that, I think that it is imperative for black folk to know what our traditional nemesis in this land is doing and thinking, because just like in Africa, our fate can be greatly altered for the worse if we do not glean these things. Black people should unify more from the understanding of this continuing external threat. What needs to be gleaned today is that most whites, but not all, still have major negative rationalizations, in regards to race, that given a trigger, could very easily take this nation back 100 years in race relations. What such trigger would do that? The answer is the same trigger that created the dichotomy in the first place, which is economics.

The goal of historical racism was to lift up white folks economically, off the backs of non white folks. Unless I am crazy, I am confident that that mission has been accomplished, as white folks dominate the nation in status and power, riding the zenith of America Inc. Consequently, there really is no good rationale for white racism today given that whites have achieved the social and economic status they desired, other than to preserve that status and power and therein lays the trigger. When America starts to decline economically, which has already began, the economic incentive for racism will return with it lead by conservative white folks coming out the closet and becoming openly racist.

For some reason many blacks, mostly black conservative types, seem to believe that white racism is now forever benign, if not cured. They don’t seem to entertain the notion that white racism could ever return to the levels of that of even 50 years ago. Maybe they feel protected by laws but laws are only of value if they are enforced by the system of justice and if the system of justice is corrupted by white racism, like Mississippi systems of justice during the 50’s and 60’s, laws will not help us. Maybe it’s the fact that we have Ak-47s and Uzis we think we can put up a good fight. However, this ignores that biological advancement and the mapping of the human Genome has created the ability to have us wiped out without us even firing a shot. In truth, we are just as vulnerable today as we were 100 or 200 years ago, because power still egregiously rest in the hands and minds of whites.

Through the understanding of this vulnerability and potential threat, it should raise the motivation for unity and advancement of our minds to the degree that we are not as vulnerable. Where is the historical example of any “ism” fading into history? There is nothing new under the sun and what was past can just as easily happen again in the present or future…and likely will unless there is a deterrent. That deterrent is unity and excellence that gives black people equal power to the degree that we are not relying on the benevolence of white humanity not to do to us in the future what they have done to us in the past. In other words, we should unify and strive not to be taken advantage of because they like us or are nice, but due to respect and fear of our power to defend ourselves. The white conservative should be all the motivation we need that this threat is alive and well.

The House of Representaive is run like a Plantation..

Hmm, I may be wrong or out of the loop, but if anyone believes the House of Representatives is being run like a Plantation than surely he or she need a history lesson. Leave it to Hilary Clinton, a white woman and a Democrat to make a silly analogy that compares Plantation rule to the business practices of Congress men and women.

For those who do not know, this is the second time Hilary has made claims that the HOR is being run like a plantation, back in 2004 she said the same thing, which goes to show if Hilary is not smacked around for telling a lie the first time around she will continue to do so in typical European fashion.

So to get to the bottom of Mrs. Clinton comparison we must juxtapose the HOR with a Plantation and see if there are any similarities we know of. The first thing we know that contradicts Hilary’s position is that every one in the HOR is a paid government official, where as those on a Plantation never received payment for their work. The HOR’s get paid Holiday breaks a few times a year, Enslaved men and women were known to only have Christmas day off. There are no female Representatives I know of that are being raped by the HOR, leadership and I can not recall any recent lynching involving a HOR member male or female. I like most of you know that HOR members can never be found working from sun up to sun down, in the hot sun and most HOR members are dressed pretty well. Again I admit I don’t know everything about Congress men and women but I know of no recent whippings handed down on the Capital floor other than weak Democrats being mopped across the floor but no whips were involved. Any of you know of a Congressman and his family being sold recently? Well clearly the HOR are not being compared to the enslaved men and women on the Plantation so now we must look at the Enslavers to see if this is what Hilary is comparing the HOR to.

The Enslavers often referred to as the “Masters” on the plantation, raped those over whom they had power, contrary to many revisionist their can never be a consensual relationship between the enslaved and the enslaver based on the nature of their relationship. Congress men and women who are elected to office are constantly raping the men and women in America if not physically than economically. The enslavers did very little work, never responded to the wishes of those whom they enslaved; Congress men and women do very little work and do not follow or respond to the wishes of their constituents and are whores to the lobbyist. The enslaver were known to dress nice, much like Congress men and women, The enslaver opposed anything meant to uplift Black folk in America, much like the Congress.

Maybe Hilary is right, the HOR is run like a Plantation, a Plantation of “Masters” because there sure as hell is nothing comparable to the life of the enslaved to the life of a congress person.

Corruption!

I would like to revisit a topic that really irks me and that Topic is the ubiquitous tendency of Western governments to blame failing or failed capitalistic democracies on corruption. You never hear a failed socialist, Stalinist or Marxist system being explained away by the corrupt nature of its individual leaders, the blame goes to the theoretical constructs themselves….not the people implementing it. The wheat needs to be separated from the chafe to harvest the truth, but the threshing is failing due to capitalist obfuscating its failures via propaganda.

It’s a logical fallacy to assume that corruption always produces economic failures. Indeed political and institutional corruption can and often does, and in fact has throughout history, coexist with economic growth and success. The only time that corruption gets highlighted is when the promise of democratization and capitalism fails to materialize the uplifting of standards of living and economic activity. Thus, given that the model is marketed and sold as superior system that is THE salivation for humanity, when it fails to produce the product proponents seek to maintain its reputation by blaming those who implemented it.

The truth is that the recipe given to Developing nations lacks many of the ingredients used to create the success of Western Capitalistic Democracies. What the West conveniently leaves out the recipe is many key ingredients to it success because the West does not want to admit much of its success is rooted in those ingredients. What ingredients you ask? Well, how about the forceful takeover of others peoples land and labor in order to synergize with Capital. A key ingredient to Western success is that it transferred wealth and energy (labor), by force, from the benefit and ownership of others to the benefit and ownership of Western entities.

Much of the success of the West has been due to seesaw economics. One group of people is lifted up by the means of placing the weight of disenfranchisement upon another group of peoples via exploiting their land, labors and freedom. These ingredients to Western success are known facts; however, the West refuses to link any of their success on these acts, lest they be held accountable. By the way, these actions by the West were corrupt and or amoral, yet it led to the flourishing of these Western societies and economies. So, empirical evidence shows that corruption and amoral politicians and laws are no impediment to growth. Of course, if other nations add these ingredients to given recipe for success, they will immediately, and rightfully, be chastised and brought to the UN Security Council for sanctions or military actions. The West was allowed by power to keep all the proceeds of its nefarious acts, while now denying others the same opportunity.

So you see, all this talk of corruption in places like Africa is simply a red herring to detract attention away from failures of the democratic capitalistic recipes given or forced upon them by the West. This is not to suggest that claims of corruption are not true, but that the corruption is not a primary of significant cause of economic failure and poverty on the continent. All one has to do is to look at the most corrupt government on the continent compared with the least corrupt and there is virtually no difference in the quality of economic and social life of the people.

All this is not to suggest that socialism, communism or other known forms of political/economic theory is any better for the people. What I am saying is that capitalism is a hollow promise as marketed because the success of much of the West has as much to do with exploitation and militarism as it does capitalism. In fact, capitalism, militarism and exploitation are the synergy that has proved to create the best results. The countries that are able to adopt capitalism and achieve elevated standards of living without militarism and egregious exploitation are nations that get a fusion of DIRECT FOREING INVESTMENT dollars from nations who have done this. In other words, Western entities take its blood money and invest it into a foreign nation(s). This money is not loans with compound interest that the receiving nation has to pay back principle and interest, but rather, direct investment. This direct foreign investment is behind much of Asia’s growth.

In conclusion, you can fool some of the people some of the time….but you can’t fool this person none of the time….because history has taught me not to trust.

BIG UPS TO 2FACE IBIDIA

I would like to give a shout out to what I consider the song and video of the previous year. This song and video should be the template for the music of our young brothers. The songs lyrics totally exemplifies Black Introspection's view of our sisters. Big Ups Again!

here is the video if you have broadband. http://www.africahit.com/video_of_the_month/number4video.htm

Stick em up. Nobody move. This is an overdraft fee!

Stick em' up or as robbers used to say in Detroit, Check it in. However, this “Jacker” is no armed hood with a heater (gun) stuck in your face; it’s your friendly Bank supposedly upholding its fiduciary responsibility via robbing you through overdraft charges and fees to increase profitability on the institution. Yeah...right!

Yes, I got jacked and that is why I am writing this Op-Ed. The other day I went online to review my checking balances and transactions and discovered over 200 dollars in overdraft charges. I honestly felt the same way that I did in the past when I came home and discovered my residence or property had been broken into and items stolen. I felt violated. I felt very angry and I felt the emotion of vengeance. I wanted to get even…but how and against whom?

Needless to say I immediately picked up the phone and called the 24 hour 1-800 number. I spoke with a rep who told me that since I had overdrafts on 3 other occasions, during the year, that they could not and would not excuse this one. So I went to my initiating branch the first business day of the week to speak with a manager. The manager again told me that he could not dismiss the charges due to past history of overcharges. I eventually told them that I will stand in front of their bank with a picket sign if they did not reverse those charges and I was serious. Eventually he agreed to take off 4 of the 7 overdraft charge transactions providing that I sign up for overdraft protection, which I did reluctantly.

Of course, people reading this will immediately say that I was irresponsible and that I did make the mistakes and knew the rules when I signed up to put my money in the institution. That’s not my beef. My beef is that the punishment does not fit the crime. It’s like having sped, getting caught and instead of getting a citation; I have to do prison time. I had 7 transactions (born from my use of debit cards for all my purchases) that totaled to less than 20 dollars overdrawn. Some for movie rental from McDonalds Red Boxes, were for 1 dollar each. For each of those transactions that I did not have funds to cover, I was charged 34 dollars. There is no cost justification for that, other than profiteering. It’s all electronic algorithms doing the work and it does not functionally cost any more to process if your account is overdrawn.

Ok, I hear all you conservative by the book defenders of the system dissenting at my attack of the system you love so dearly. Well, the kicker is that I have thousands of dollars in savings at the same bank. I purposely keep a small amount in checking because of fear that someone will get my card information (because I use it so much) and practice identity theft, emptying out my checking balance. I did not want overdraft protection because they could then tap into even more of my funds via my savings. Consequently, sometimes I don’t reconcile my balances in time, given that debit card transactions do not always manifest in real time (immediate). Therefore, given the thousands of dollars in my checking, how can the bank rationalize that it cost them anything? They did not have to loan me some of their money or someone else’s money, because my deposits in their bank could fully cover it….and then some.

The bank’s rationale was that I did not give them permission to take money from my Savings in the event that my checking account was overdrawn. Well, I also did not give them permission to charge me 34 dollars for each transaction in the red, but that did not stop them ( well...maybe I did when I signed up for the checking account, but thats not the point). Then they tell me that overdraft protection from my savings will cost me, not the 34 dollar per transaction without it, but 5 dollar per transaction of an overdrawn checking account. What the hell? How do they justify that cost? You mean to tell me that it cost them 5 dollars for the nanosecond it takes for the computer algorithm to branch to a different section of code where it will debit my savings and credit my checking to cover the overdraft? It absolutely does not. It’s simply a pretext to exploit customer’s mistakes into increased profits for the bank. What does that sound like to you? It sounds to me like the street thugs who charge you protection fees from their own thuggish behavior. Either you pay us protection money or some of our other thugs are going to come and rob you blind.

Of course the banks depend on customers savings deposits to boost the amount of money they can lend to other customers at a profit through fractional banking. They probably don't like those funds being tapped into from overdrawn checking accounts because they theoretically are using those deposits to earn interest income. Thus, the feel they must penalize people from making the account more transactional in nature, thus, threating their interest income. I am no dummy in regards to how all this works either.....its still robbery.

When you add all these things up, its just robbery pure and simple, given the constraint on their traditional nefarious acts of usury. The way the system works now is that profitability is linked to people’s mistakes and errors. The system has found away to increase profits by egregiously penalizing people who make mistakes. If you have a low interest credit card at 5%, then make one late payment or your credit situation changes with another creditor, they then rape you with a 300% increase in your interest rate. If you are a person with poor credit, instead of not giving you a loan because you fall into bad risk, they charge you two or three times the average rate of interest. Of course, if a person has a poor history of repayment or income to debt ratio, making their payments much higher is not going to increase the probability that they will repay it. You even have the insurance industry rationalizing charging higher premiums, based not upon accidents or claims, but credit reports. The more mistakes you made with your credit, the higher your insurance premiums. Of, course; there are hundreds, if not thousands, of other ways capitalism is becoming a predatory practice, not limited to what I mentioned.

Capitalism has become like the jungle, with predators watching for signs of weakness or injury in the herds of prey to pounce on and devourer for nourishment. Profiteers hover like vultures or sharks when they smell blood waiting to pick apart and digest anyone who slips up or becomes vulnerable and in need. The profiteers then swoop down upon the prey under the auspicious of being concerned and looking out for the preys needs and interest. The prey, often time with a lack of choices or knowledge of choices and in need, becomes credulous and hence victimized.

Blacks are their own worst enemy

How many times have you heard someone make the suggestion that black people are their own worst enemy? I have personally heard it stated overtly or implied more than enough for a lifetime. How can any living entity be its own worst enemy given that biologically, all life is wired to promote survival and perpetuation? Is not this notion really suggesting that something is wrong with the biological programming of black folk relative to other folk? Isn’t such an assumption or conclusion simply a more politically correct or acceptable way of forwarding the notion of black inferiority? I think so.

Every action a person makes, instinctive and conscious, is made to promote survival and or the pleasure of survival, unless there is faulty wiring or physical or emotional pain to the degree that makes a person seek termination. When people make choices it is because the mental calculus has concluded that the act will best promote or stimulate survival. Life does not program entities to promote self destruction, at least not until reproduction, the second prime directive. The two greatest pleasures in life are eating and sex, not necessarily in that order. They are the greatest pleasures because they facilitate the prime directives. All our actions are born from biologically motivated calculation to fulfill pleasure because pleasure is biologically associated with promoting survival. Pain indicates threat to our survival and pleasure indicates promotion of our survival. Thus, people make choices in life to promote pleasure and not pain. Hence, to be our own worst enemy we must be guilty of not seeking pleasure.

People choose the pleasures that their environments have to offer and pleasure is not all physical, but also psychological. Social rank and status is a form of pleasure that serves as a conduit to physical pleasures that promote the second prime directive. The problem for black folk is that our historical and contemporary environment and experiences are different enough in degree or kind that the choices we make differ from others. We all want rank and pleasure however different environments dispense rank and pleasure differently. The dispensing of rank and pleasure in oppressed communities in America conditions behavior that in the long run is detrimental, but pleasurable in the short run. Contrarily, in the non-oppressed communities where people are conditioned that opportunity is boundless, if one follows a process, pleasure in a long term calculus predicated on the process.

In short, the black environment has been conditioned toward short term pleasures and immediate gratification while the white community has been conditioned to seek rank and pleasure based upon a long term process. One of the consequences of years of discrimination against blacks is that black people don’t have faith in the “process” to the degree that white folks do and for good reason. Thus, when faith in the process has been forsaken through the conditioning of empirical evidence, such people make different choices and seek immediate gratification and status and rank as defined by the environment that they know and live in. In actuality, these people for a short time achieve rank and pleasure in their communities…which hardly makes them their own worst enemy in the short run, but rather, successful. However, rank and success in a culture shaped from oppression can lead to failure and punishment by the dominate culture.

In conclusion, I don’t believe that black people are our own worst enemy. To make that suggestion is to make the suggestion that black people are biologically inferior.