VAN JONES ON MY MIND, DAMMIT

I triple dog dare 45 to attend a funeral for nine (yes nine) victims of a race-driven mass murder inside a Charleston, South Carolina church. I want him to stand at the pulpit of Mother Emmanuel and speak from his heart to a child or wife or sister wrapped in misery. I dare 45 to speak from his heart about a Mosque being fire-bombed or two innocent Indian people being terrorized for being from another country or a Jewish cemetery being vandalized .... 

Then, after speaking from his heart, I wanna feel 45 so moved to solo on an acapella opening of Amazing Grace. I want a deacon, also moved by the spirit, to get his back and exhort, "take yo' time" ... as the entire congregation stands and sings in unison. Then, and ONLY then, can we can talk about the first two vocabulary letters in the word, "Presidential."

Rather than analyze the content of 45's TelePrompTer lip sync, Van Jones got caught up in theatrics and (of) low expectations. Wrong on so many levels. Reading is NOT an accomplishment and every line is not an applause line. How could one person not shout, "YOU LIE!"? - Mark Lassiter

THE BALLOT AND THE BULLET

 So ... here I am standing in front of my ballot and thinking ... I never heard any Plans or details throughout the whole campaign. I still don't know what Hillary's plans are for our involvement in the Middle East, economic and fiscal issues with China, Great Britain, Israel, Cuba, the Congo and other military spots involved within Africa, the re-structuring of education, tax cuts and or increases, she stated she wasn't for ObamaCare, then she was for it and then she is all about re-structuring it ... still don't know the details. I haven't heard anything about Wall Street's role in giving back the rest of the funds (all the ill gained interest) from the bailout, I haven't heard anything about the continued investigations and lawsuits from the people/banks that orchestrated the crash, we already know how she feels about Land Rights and Treaties broken and thus dishonored the Native Peoples but what about Puerto Rico? What about Haiti? " I heard the "apology" for her role in Mass Incarceration but what about her plan to undo the damage? I already know that reparations will never be on the table for discussion.

What about those Drones where over 80% of the people killed are innocent civilians; men, women, children and the sick and elderly that couldn't and can't move? What is her jobs plan besides piggybacking on Obama's plan (obstructed for years) which is to create MORE Government Jobs? Didn't we see how disastrous that was during the 1990's. What was her Private Sector Plan? I am not even going to ask about Trump because he has no Plan just that it will be a "Great Plan" and Publicly

stated he is going to "wing the Presidency" with statements like "What do you have to loose?". Now that we have seen all the hate seeded and nurtured during this campaign, I heard no statement on how to deal with it outside platitudes. Is there even Plan?

Throughout this whole campaign, the only two people whom addressed NATIONAL PLANS and DOCTRINES where Bernie Sanders and Jill Stein. Not one candidate GOP or DEM even made a statement or a plan on what they want to accomplish in detail for the United States. Not one New Deal or an Old Deal. Even Trump has fallen flat and he is suppose to be the "DEAL MAKER". They all spoke in generalities and cliche but none had PLANS. Am I to assume that we are to do "more of the same", because the same is what and how we got here. I am not feeling it. I am not comfortable. Maybe, as Malcolm X stated, "We are chumps". And while I am on the subject ..... WHO THE F@&#$ ARE THESE OTHER MOFO's ON THE BALLOT !!! I HAVE NO IDEA WHO THIS BEGGIN' CONGRESSMAN, SENATOR, JUDGE, LOCAL BOARD, NONE OF THESE @#%$-ASS MOFO'S ARE. THEY DIDN'T CAMPAIGN, WALK MY STREET, NO FLYERS, MAIL BOX STUFFING, NO SNAGGLE-TOOTH T-SHIRT WEARING POLLSTER TRYING TO GET ME TO LOOK AT THEM SERIOUSLY OR A CHEAP ASS POLITICAL AD ..... AND YOU ALL PROPPED YOUR POLITICALLY RATCHET ASS RIGHT UNDER HILLARY CLINTON .... ??? WHERE IS MY #@&%'n WRITE-IN BALLOT ?!?!?!?! "

Muhammad Ali

Muhammad Ali  R.I.P.

 

TO THE LOST MILLENNIALS

My generation never abandoned the Millennials, it was their love of the "other" America, the one where collectively they decided to drop the African in the African-American for just being American. The generation that rejected our constant reminders, pleas, lessons, dialogue, history and stories of our past legacies that has brought them full circle to this moment. It was and still is their LOVE AND HIPHOP consciousness that is keeping them from picking up the work put on "pause" and Turn-Up on the people we kept reminding people were not "your friends". When we said, "The revolution will not be televised." We were direct and clear. No Cartoons, No Coonery, No Shuckin'-n-Jivin', No Parties, Fashion Show, False Entertaining Prophets and definitely No Procrastination. The same critical mass of people then are still here now, we just are older, more tired and have old shoes worn out from the marching, marching and more marching. So you can't blame us, its the Millennials that have to catch up on the work delayed and find your strength, shake the brainwashing and abandon the fear that is called "sacrificing for the future".

WHEN BLACK MOTHERS NEED TO LET GO OF THEIR BOYS TO BECOME MEN

Before I get in, can we take a moment to observe the mother, what she represented, the language, the dress, the attitude? OK ... now for my POV:

I love Mom and I know she meant well but her MALE CHILD'S purpose was to protect his future and as such, his MOTHER. This is what MEN do. This is what Black folk have done since chained and bound for our Trans-Atlantic kidnapping from Africa. There isn't a time or generation Black Men and Black Boys have not had to step up and represent Civil and Human Disobedience to survive in The Americas. At no time in American History has the country freely extended Human Rights to Black folk. It hasn't freely done so to Hispanics, Native Americans and Indigenous Peoples, Women or to its own White folk for what matters. That being said, I can't honestly say I know all the details and background of this mother's intent but I do know it was personal, counterproductive and selfish to her cause of; "let some other kid get hurt and die and not mine" and all the while those others are taking the hit for her not seeing the Big Picture. The MAN in her child that needed to grow, evolved and experience what needs to be done is/was being crushed. THIS IS WHY SINGLE WOMEN NEED A STRONG MALE ROLE MODEL FOR THEIR SONS. JUST FOR MOMENTS LIKE THIS.

Imagine in India, South Africa, Mexico, Syria, Libya, Russia, Pakistan, China, Korea, Palestine, Vietnam, Columbia, Argentina, Poland, Romania, Latvia, Estonia, Ireland, Egypt, Burma, the Congo, Ivory Coast, Haiti and I can probably list 50 more countries had mothers telling their children ... their male sons, to stay indoors, to STOP throwing rocks at an oppressive force that uses military tools to oppress them, kill them and their families and keep them in fear? To coddled and sheltered their BOYS ... their YOUNG MEN? The attitude of "NOT MINE" doesn't work when you are fighting for justice. This is the "sheeple" way of looking at life. She has in essence tamed and neutered her child into submission maintaining that only Martin Luther King Jr. is the way and light for social justice is the only way for pushing the agenda of human rights forward.

What needed to be done was she should have been by her son's side guiding him in a way (or out of the way) that had equal impact. If she didn't know how, then a person equal to the

challenge should have been by her side or had that person guide him. Be it mentor, pastor, boyfriend or MISSING FATHER. And just like people have issues with public shaming on the Internet, I have issue with the public castration of Black Boys to Men because we are too scared to "Do the Right Thing". You all do remember that movie right? No one left the theater saying how you would have told your child not to react and get involved then. You actually applauded the actions because it was real enough to connect to. If that was true then, when did it become fantasy today? Same actions, same scenario just absent the stereo.

This mother was wrong in her methods because at the end of the day, if her child had his neck broken by the Baltimore police and got off without accountability, she'd want more than a few kids throwing rocks at their oppressors. She'd take all and every attempt to Right what was/is wrong with the System. She coddled him into submission and this his Manhood took a backseat to a mother's misguided notion that what was going on was too ignorant, dangerous and un-Manly for him to experience. A warrior to the cause taken out by an unfriendly fire, a Mother from the inside. So now I have to ask, who was more dangerous, the Baltimore police for murdering a Black Man and getting away with it or a Millennial Mother not connected to the history to how she was able to achieve her relaxed two toned hair, hoop earrings, gold necklaces and watch, makeup, nails, high heel shoes, club dressed with a Love and HipHop attitude? Her agenda was to keep her Boy a Baby and let others do the heavy lifting while her stay at home and wait for the benefits to continue to rain down as those in the 1950's, 60's 70's and still into the 2000's are doing. Her excuse was that she didn't want her child to be another Freddy Gray ..... truth be told, he already is. I get it, she is a MOTHER but like all

things that matter and affect boys, you have to allow them to be Men, make mistakes and let them go.I used the word coddling for this Mother's actions defined as a disease. Yes, respecting one's mother means coddling, in my opinion, if a mother actions keep a Boy from becoming MALE or keeps the Boy so closed off to the World that he becomes stymied by its reality and easy prey for manipulation and easy marginalized as an adult male. This situation required a MALE point of view which would have allowed this boy to make a balanced and focused decision (i.e. a Male and Female perspective). Granted there are Men who feel the same way the Mother did or does and may have told this boy not to get "involved" but the only difference is that the Male would have represented "differently". This wasn't about safety for her child, it was about NOT letting her child make an adult decision to do what he felt was the RIGHT THING."I went because in the past, a lot of my friends have been beaten, killed, abandoned, hurt by the police—so I went down there just to fight for what I stand for ..." - Michael Singleton, the Young Man who was beaten by his mother participating in Civil Disobedience in Baltimore Md.

"We should applaud our young Black (boys) for having bravery their parents' have not." - Craig Schley

MY OPINION

TO GIVE UP FREEDOM

I can't tell you how many people have tried to "brainwash" me in debate, conversation, posting and lecture into freely giving up my FREEDOM to be handcuffed by a police officer when innocent. KEYWORD: Freedom. New York Mayor De Blasio had the audacity to suggested that AMERICANS (Black and Latinos) should always adhere to an officers demands to be handcuffed (guilty until they determined you are innocent) to prevent an "altercation". An altercation for what?

In essence, the Mayor of New York, whom Black and Latinos voted for to deal with the over-policing and harassing measures of the NYPD and its legal system, he is asking for those same voters whom are at the center of legal violations to "silently and orderly give up their FREEDOM before he; THE MAYOR, has even "ATTEMPTED" to deal with these issues?  That the creation of and "altercation"; a noisy argument or disagreement, especially in public ..... is un-American and unacceptable when told and or demanded to give up their FREEDOM freely and without question? Peacefully? EXCUSE ME BUT THE LAW AND PROTOCOL is to state what the crime is (if there is one) first and when asked by the accused and not exercise some skewed act of Jurisprudence until they can figure out a charge they can use to justify their action(s).

I can't tell you how many times this has happened to me. EVEN IN PLACES WHERE I WORK. I have never allowed an officer to handcuff me, My FREEDOM is given to me by GOD and it is in knowing that, a gift that I do not and will not give to anyone. This frustrates the police when a person stands their ground because intimidation is key to their protocol for arresting and or subduing people.

I am not asleep and my mind is sharp ... you can not tell me that giving up your FREEDOM to authority without question is normal. If anything it is the actions of animals led to slaughter. HELL .... even pigs fight before they are made into bacon for your BLT sandwiches.

REVOLUTION

I’ve seen sparks flare and rocks fly

Crashing against brows that pulsate blood

feeding

Knowledge and pride

for a tribe.

my Home,

our family.

It’s a light,

like stars,

that dance

Smack

HARD

And wakes the senses

allowing you,

and everyone present know

that THIS is reality.

Be it live or recorded

you now stand at the front line of the Revolution.

I took a side and it is Hot, and Violent, Physical

Wonderful.

This will be the re-start of that circle in Mayan history

where everything repeats because as Man and Men

we keep forgetting the struggle

That life, liberty and the over pursuit of prosperity

eventually and ultimately

kills us.

Bible Quran Torah taught us,

this.

We have embraced humanity’s less exorcised

and re-swallowed pea-soup of bile and blades

served up on money green platters and platinum card dreams.

Swooned and swayed to diamond jingle bells

and shook bags of sugar ‘till it dropped like its Hot.

Cars like deadly caterpillars munching on black filled pipes,

sucking hard on the excremental breast milk of Mother Earth.

People followed and realized that the beat they heard was not of the heart

but of the cellular ringtones from bill collectors calling

cursing your ass out to pay your bills.

It was a beat that burped and belched that your stomach is tight and empty

It was a hollow treble that echoed from your foreclosed home

And the hammer knocking in your neighbor’s lawn

signs reading,

… AND YOU 2 GET THE FUQ OUT.

Here everyone in the land is looking to the sky for a Superman

while rocking back and forth counting beads and molesting crosses

with dirty fingers that once traced remotes that channeled every talk show created.

in this reality sits a people who

stopped singing Negro spirituals praising Jesus …

a long time ago,

and replaced him with Pink Floyd

The gospel:

“We don’t need no education
We don’t need no thought control
No dark sarcasm in the class room
(yells) Hey, teachers! Leave those kids alone!”

Because the man got it right:

I and we were just another brick in the Wall.

Praying for simple solutions,

the devil in us turned GOD into DOG

And in return

got a nation that shit and pissed all over each other.

Funny thing about shit and piss,

it is the one true method that dogs communicate

and the World made sure we did not become pedigrees

living in our own American backyard.

Unlike thunder or like lightning, the rumble in the distance

is missing.

No more can we count on the people to carry pitch forks

German Sheppards and high pressure hoes,

or spit and slur words of hate.

This is a different time, a different place

This whole party goes beyond Race.

Mutts, junkyard and strays in our own diversity

where television sells us on the notion that Poor is Fashionable and Cheap is Cool

SPAM is caviar and Ramen Noodles is part of the 4 basic food groups.

Holy Men dancing with baby boys and Women becoming famous for their anger and pain,

who could ever image a bunch of dirty kids from New Jersey’s shore

would be the welcoming ambassadors for a generation.

We look around

 and become rabbit when what little is left is thrown in the middle

of a hungry pack,

and we draw blood.

Ethnic blood

 in a frenzy, and we still can’t see that it is all Red.

Because in truth, we are dead inside.

Hollow.

A cesspool of mediocrity and mendacity.

Dank and dark even in our most enlighten moments.

Complacent like meat fried up to give the next generation heartburn and diabetes

We medicate on the idea that we are great only because we are American.

And if we turn down the music, just enough

we just might hear the scant chuckle of Shaitan

and the quite tears of GOD,

opposite ends,

opposite sides of Ying and Yang.

Like the center of the circle in history,

 this is now cause,

 this the catalyst

for

The Revolution.

WHY U SCARED OF ME

Why you scared of me?

Is it something deep inside.

Deep deep inside?

Shadow guised?

Keeping check the pride

that you eyed?

Is my time in the limelight

too bright?

My pockets gorged green

to capacities out of common sight?

Is my fight before your coming

too hyped?

My work,

like a Hebrew slave

that stayed,

cracked base like cracked Cain

leaving your pyramid undone.

Why you scared of me?

Is my truth so real?

When I say I love you

you shake back

to the moment of your conception.

My need to be your Man,

dancing passion and kind,

washed your doubts smooth,

like skin,

feeling you freely

until you are mine.

 

END

As we grow older we begin to understand that the last part of things

can be just as beautiful as a beginning.

Then we can truly appreciate what has gone before.

That being said,

American the beautiful

American the brave.

American written in the  Fall

America’s winter in Gray.

Revolution.

Revolution is the sole property of Shazza Nakim, all Rights Reserved and is published with written permission by the artist. (c) Copyright 2014