Clearing out the bookmarks

Back in the groove of things, here's some stuff I've come across recently that caught my interest and hopefully it will do the same for you.

First off, got to speak on this on-going story involving who supposedly took down Nidal Malik Hasan, who orchestrated the massacre at Fort Hood. The New York Times first reported here that Sgt. Kimberly Denise Munley did it in a nice story that touched all the right chords and really drove home just how much of a hero Munley was. Unfortunately the Times and reporter James C. McKinley Jr. were WRONG, WRONG (c) Charlie Murphy.

This is the person who really handled business at Fort Hood — Senior Sgt. Mark Todd. You can read more about him here.

Aint really got much to say, except that this is an epic fail for the NYT, but it could happen to any publication, sometimes a story looks so good and feels so good (especially in light of a horrible happening like at Ft. Hood) that you overlook some small things like the young woman getting lit up by Hasan and still being able to subdue the man despite her sprite-like frame (yeah, she was supposedly tough, but come on, man (c) C. Ochocinco).

Also, its nice to see a brotha come out on top in a story like this. More on the mixup here.
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More good news for black folks: NEW SLUM VILLAGE!

If you don't know who SV is, stop reading my blog now! (Naw, j/k, I need the views). For real though, this is one of my favorite groups ever and it is a group that day after day is still absorbing the blow of losing two of its original members very prematurely, Jay Dee and Baatin.

Fans of the Slum should be happy to know that both Dilla and Baatin will be a part of the group's newest CD "Villa Manifesto," coming next year. A preview EP is being scheduled before the LP as well. Can't wait.

Here's a dope new track, "Dope Man," from the Villa fam.
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Real good black news here: my alma-mater Southern Illinois University-Carbondale is on the road to establishing Africana Studies as a major study at the University, this comes after years of "Black American Studies" being merely a minor. From one of SIU's greatest citizens, the good Dr. and Rev. Joseph A. Brown, who has led the BAS as long as I can remember down there:

Yesterday, November 10, 2009, the SIUC Faculty Senate approved a proposal to 1) establish a major in Africana Studies, thereby 2) changing the name of the existing program from "Black American Studies." This represents the work of persistent warriors over 40 years of struggle.

The next stage is for the proposal to be submitted to the SIU Board of Trustees. Once that approval is granted the proposal will be sent to the Illinois Board of Higher Education. In the midst of the devastating financial crisis facing the State of Illinois and SIUC, we are still advancing this cause, having established ourselves as having enough courses and collaborators already in place not to require significant funding to make the shift.

We will need, now more than ever, the sustained support of alumni and other benefactors, because at the first sign of stumbling much of what we have accomplished will be challenged. The walls of Jericho are beginning to sway....

Amen.
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And here is one of the best short films I've ever seen: Vin Diesel's "Multi-Facial" from 1995.



Back when big Diesel first became a star this piece was mentioned a lot in his back story, and its easy to see why. Diesel wrote, produced and directed this personal take on his time auditioning as a starving actor in New York, deftly navigating in and between racial stereotypes while trying to please casting directors.

Been recently posted on YouTube, so make sure you double-click and check out both parts (runs just over 20 minutes in all) cause it is a real nice personal film with depth. This film led to Steven Spielberg casting Diesel in "Saving Private Ryan" and thus Diesel going on to become a big action star, but I wonder what would have happened if he took time out to extend this into a full feature or at least work on more independent, low-key projects like this.
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And finally, while on the subject of cats not so comfortable in their own skin. You know where I'm going with this...

Aye dios mio, Sammy. Get better...do better.

Michael Jordan's Hall of Fame Induction Speech

Yes, MC Breed was right, Mike (Michael Jordan) was a itsy bit triflin' — he's addicted to snowflakes (check the one on his side here), he's almost insufferably competitive and he has the nerve to entertain a comeback at 50 (that just cannot happen) — but when I look at dude I'm still in awe. Michael Jordan is reason No. 1 why I love the Chicago Bulls and Chicago sports in general and thus sports in general, I was born as a sports fan as he led the Bulls to their first World Titles and through his many title runs and all the great dunks and impossible lay-ups and gritty defensive stands and heart-stopping game-winning shots I learned a lot of what greatness is.

I learned what it means to set goals and achieve them.

I learned when said goals aren't enough that it isn't bad to look elsewhere for satisfaction even if the entire world thinks you will fail.

I learned when you fail looking for that other satisfaction that there's nothing wrong with going back to where you started.

I learned how one can re-invent and make their game stronger and finish their career the right way, and the wrong way, and then the right way again.

In my adult life, as he transitioned into his post-basketball playing life, some of the sheen has been taken off of my greatest hero, but as brilliantly as he shined when I was a child Mike could never look like a dud to me, maybe a milk dud (look at that dome, lol.)

Congratulations MJ, the GOAT once and always.

NBA.com 2009 Hall of Fame coverage

Deon Cole on Conan O'Brien

From another great blog, 3030fm.com, here's video of comedian and Chicago native Deon Cole on The Tonight Show. This blew by me when it happened, real glad I was able to eventually catch it. Deon's definitely a dude more people should be up on and I hope this appearance helped that out. Includes real funny riffs on Michael Jackson and on his new Gucci belt and he also does his joke checklist bit- one of the funniest in comedy today.

Deon Cole – Conan O’Brien Show – 8/5/2009

Posted using ShareThis

Rappers impersonating other rappers

Just wanted to put this up to work on my embedding skills, but this is a good video though, it features Q-Tip impersonating (and kind of roasting) his long time partner-in-crime Busta Rhymes. Would love to have heard Busta in the room with him and being able to fire back, bet that'd been real funny. Oh, and peep the "Kamaal the Abstract" poster in the back- finally coming out for real this fall, that's what's up.

Exclusive: Q-Tip Impersonates Busta Rhymes.. LOL (VladTV.com)



Of course, upon seeing this I also got to see this video of Pharrell hilariously impersonating both Q-Tip and Busta, originally seen here. Straight LMBAO material here. Stuff like this makes it worth it that rappers in general can't help filming themselves and putting it on youtube and elsewhere nowadays. The stuff Pharrell kicks with DJ Premier is priceless too, and apparently Chris Brown is in the background somewhere (can't vouch for it yet, haven't re-watched yet, but that's what the youtube minions are saying).

Plaxico means peace

Just wanted to show off this great shirt that I came across not too long ago:

Definitely one to rock, given the latest news on the receiver who can't shoot straight (wonder how much else he couldn't do straight in the immediate time after putting that slug into himself. The shirt itself is very clever, especially after you see that the word "Plaxico" in fact means "peace," as described by the good folks at motheringhut.com who are selling the shirt. Although I'm not sure what "in Africa" means, there's no language of African. Might have to look into that one yourself but if one single dialect translates Plaxico to peace then that's all the shirt needs.

As for the story itself: quite sad all around, still very hard to feel bad for the guy though. If this story doesn't have cats think twice about carrying firearms, let alone unregistered gats, out in public places where there's really no reason to have them, then I don't know what will.

Plus Plax will get a chance to redeem himself, the NFL announced today that they will re-instate Shooter after he serves his two-year bid. That's the good news, the bad: Shooter will be in his mid-30's when he gets out. Who's gonna want him? Don't know, but under "who may need him," I'll take the Bears for $200, Alex.

Brits fail to understand "The Wire"

This is a pretty funny news item considering half the damn cast on The Wire is English or some type of Great Brit.

The series may have garnered critical recognition for its unflinching realism and searing dialogue, but the street argot spoken by its characters – most of whom are black American drug dealers and street-wise detectives – has left many viewers straining to make sense of the dialogue.

Now, one of the central writers of the show has lashed out at those who turn on the subtitles, rendering the show a "comedy" rather than the gritty, intelligent drama he intended it to be.

George Pelecanos, writer of some of the series' greatest episodes ("Hamsterdam", "Middle Ground", "That's Got His Own" - to self: need to get up on his novel stuff) is the writer who is getting a little out of shape, which is his right to, I just think this whole issue comes down simply to smart niggas and smart-dumb niggas (c) Ghostface. You got to be in a certain place mentally and emotionally to watch The Wire, it can come from some experience with the kind of world it is portraying or it could come from just having and open mind and the kind of mind that picks up on the subtleties that can make a piece of storytelling like the whole of "The Wire" the great pieces of storytelling they are. There are plenty of smart-dumb cats in America who never got the show or who thought they got it and went on to under appreciate it. This comment on the story page basically sums it up.

theelectrician wrote:
Monday, 17 August 2009 at 07:15 am (UTC)
I am a 52 year old British man who's spent his entire life in Britain (except for a couple of package holidays) and I had no problems watching, enjoying and understanding The Wire. I watched it about a year ago (via second hand DVDs) and I had to make the effort to ration my viewing or I'd have been up beyond midnight every night for many days.

Watching The Wire is an intellectual challenge at first because of the slang the different accents and the different culture that it presents. If you have at least an ounce of brains and any kind of willingness to make some intellectual effort then you can 'get into it' after a couple of episodes. It is one of the best TV series I have ever seen and is totally compelling.

The example glossary provided at the end of this article makes me laugh. If you can't work out what a 'Stash house' is (without even seeing the programme) and you can't figure out that 'Walk-around money' is used by corrupt politicians for bribes - when you are watching them using it and talking about it - then you really should stick to reality tv and games shows; that would be your natural limit."

Used subtitles to watch The Wire? The writer says that's just criminal (The Independant)

Some thoughts on the health care debate

Since this whole clusterfuck of a debate on what we should do with the health care infrastructure in this country began to explode, I haven't at any point likened myself as an expert on the issue, nor have I acted like I knew exactly what we needed to do in spite of not knowing exactly what was going on or what was at stake (unlike so many freakin others in this country).

Really I'm just riding with Obama on this one, mainly because I voted for that man with a mind that he could change the way this goddam country does things and change it more than any president before him. Obama says that the type of health care legislation he's pushing for is the direction that we need to go in, so I'm there. Plus I'm secure in what I got (health care of my choosing from Gannett), while at the same time unsatisfied with what we have as a nation (no reason why anybody shouldn't have health coverage, let alone some 40 million, which is what I last heard).

Anyhow...I know what side I'm on and it isn't on the side of them brain-dead holla'n idiots who are shouting down anything that looks like real reform. I've really been disheartened by the talk of getting rid of the govt. run plan to compete with private providers. Obama trying to save face saying that the public option is only a "little sliver" of the overall plan, but it seems to me to be the whole point of this thing. Yeah, we're trying to keep this plan from drowning in taxpayer funds but how else will more people who need health care get it if we don't have a true alternative to the already very-expensive private insurance industry. As NYT op-ed columist Bob Herbert wrote for Tuesday's edition:

The hope of a government-run insurance option is all but gone. So there will be no effective alternative for consumers in the market for health coverage, which means no competitive pressure for private insurers to rein in premiums and other charges. (Forget about the nonprofit cooperatives. That’s like sending peewee footballers up against the Super Bowl champs.)

Insurance companies are delighted with the way “reform” is unfolding. Think of it: The government is planning to require most uninsured Americans to buy health coverage. Millions of young and healthy individuals will be herded into the industry’s welcoming arms. This is the population the insurers drool over.

It scares me just how willfully ignorant people scared of any kind of change have hijacked this whole discussion. I haven't heard any approach to this issue as clear-headed as the one Paul Krugman offered on Monday, breaking down this nation's care among that of the rest of the developed world, which we act like we want to lead without doing the necessary work it takes (I know, I know, I'm positioning myself as a Times-waving liberal, which I'm really not, but its where I go for my national news- at least until they start making folks pay online again. Give me an argument from the other side as reasonable and I'll post it here as well).

Reading that column literally calmed me down, until I got to the last paragraph:

So we can do this. At this point, all that stands in the way of universal health care in America are the greed of the medical-industrial complex, the lies of the right-wing propaganda machine, and the gullibility of voters who believe those lies.

Yeah, all that stands in the way is RW propaganda and gullible voters. The only thing that RW propaganda and gullible voters needs to stand in the way of is all the sensible citizens of this nation and the muhfuckin grand canyon. Then all we'll need is a little push.

Good luck, Obama.

Clearing out the bookmarks

Couple of good recent stories from the New York Times:

First, a look at the first non-white person to ever play in the NBA: Wat Misaka, who played for the Knicks for a short time in the late 40's.

Definitely a trip for me, I'd have never thought that the first "colored" person in the Association would be of Japanese decent. Real impressed with his college story, he definitely deserved to get his shot, of course in the end his basketball career wound up being a victim of the times but the man himself still went on to have a full life. The story centers around his first visit to the Garden since the 40's, that return should have happened a long time ago as should have Misaka's return to the spotlight.

In this story a brother braver than most maybe on his way to competing in the 2012 Paralympic Games and could be as good of an amputated athlete as we've seen. Jerrod Fields is a Chicagoan (which always gets much love from me), grew up in the hood, managed to just avoid the ganglife and eventually went on to serve in Iraq, where he lost the bottom half of his left leg gruesomely:

...reports of a dead dog on a Baghdad road — animal carcasses were often booby-trapped with explosives — led his platoon to drive in to investigate.

The dog itself was harmless, but still a trap. A small bomb went off nearby. Fields laughed; he thought he had dropped a grenade. Then another explosion destroyed his lower left leg.

Fields kept his wits enough to drive his Bradley armored vehicle and fellow troops out of danger. But when he eventually came to in a hospital in Germany, he was so disoriented that he tried to choke his nurse. (“The last thing I remembered was fighting,” he said.) Doctors explained what had happened, and told Fields they could rebuild his leg by grafting muscle and fusing his ankle.


Fields wasn't having that, he went for the amputation, and he still may serve again in the Middle East. Amazing.

An Injured Soldier Re-Imerges as a Sprinter (NYT)

Movin on up (my weekend at NABJ)

We movin on up in da world like elevators
Me and the crew we pimps like eighty-two
Me and you like Tony Toni Tone
- Big Boi

Thought I was slightly hungover when I woke up today, but actually not, not even a little bit. Feel no pain in my head, just a little feeling, something that reminded me when my phone jolted me out of my sleep a little while ago that I have a working cerebrium in my skull, which is good, I'm going through two airports today.

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At Tampa International now. The screen at my gate still reads a New York flight that leaves at 2:50. My flight for Detroit (connecting to Chicago) is supposed to start letting people on there at 3:00, hope there isn't no delay BS going on. I don't know, I probably sound stupid (I do where to check but I don't want my business center terminal to get snatched up), I just need to get used to traveling more and navigating airports if I'ma become the international player that I strive to be.

Have flown much more in the past four years than I had in the 21 years prior, four times as much (four times from 06) and I got my first celebrity airport story: meeting Hulk Hogan right after we both went through the TSA search. He wound up being cool, called me "brother" two times (here is where I would post some youtube video showing how he calls people "brother" in interviews but the airport service aint letting me- I need a wireless card).

I think later I'll list up all the influential and meaningful people I met and talked to this weekend, in my mind it seems like an amazing list. Probably won't mean shit to you but it did to me, this was truly a great weekend, I feel slightly changed. The feeling is bullshit, it'll fade as I return to my day-to-day routine, but I truly feel lifted right now and that is not a corny reference to flight. Speaking of which, mine has now been pushed back to 5:30 from 3:30. Delay bullshit, indeed. Guess I'll finish this blog sooner than I expected.

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Conclusion:

I need to do a better job of just getting things out, I guess I'll get better with that as I continue with this blog. Anyhow... it turns out the flight still was on time, it just moved to a different gate. I rushed over to the other gate, flew to Detroit (where you got to pay to use the internet in their airport), and then flew home, parting dangerous looking storm clouds as we entered the airspace over Midway Airport. Let me stop with this though, before this becomes more about some shit that doesn't mean anything.
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It being late Friday now the sheen of the past weekend has long went away. That would have been the case even if the week hadn't sucked like it did (nothing real important, just the same ol'- late hours at work, fending off creditors, scrounging up money for food, keeping from getting evicted, etc) but the whole time has been like a rapid decent from above the clouds, or a malfunctioning elevator jerking your ass down several flights. In Tampa it was "me and you, your mama and your cousin too"-- NABJ really is like fam, even better in some ways (no emotional baggage weighing us down), now its just me again. I rocked the shirt down there:

Me &
You &
Yo Momma &
Yo Cousin
Too

Clever, culturally so, it gets a reaction from certain people who love Outkast, as I do, and bam- you got a friend for a moment. I rock the shirt now and nobody knows what the fuck it means, they tilt their heads and ask "what does that mean." That being said I haven't given my fair Wisconsinites the chance to see the shirt, but I know well enough. I know what floor I'm on once again. I know where I stand in the stratosphere. The clouds never looked so far away. I'll keep reaching though, I really can't do nothing else- maybe someone will boost me up, maybe I'll have an unexpected growth spurt, maybe what's up there will come to me and I can trap it and examine it (get my District 9 on). Like I said, ain't nothing else to do, least I know a good tune to hum as the time passes.

My old ish

Around the time that I decided to get this blog off the ground again I took a look at another discarded page of mine hosted on blogspot that I'd almost forgot about. Out of my supposed college hot-shot edginess I called it "Da Meanest Blog" and to my slight surprise I think I did a better job then I originally thought in documenting a key part of my life thus far.

The blog started in the summer of 2006, I was an intern at the Wausau Daily Herald and unbeknownst to my then-self was starting my grand, still-evolving adventure in central Wisconsin. I started it as part of my obligation as a Chips Quinn Scholar, the name of the fantastic organization which every year places dozens of the best aspiring journalists of color and place them in many of our nation's newsrooms for intensive runs as interns.

In this blog you can see some of my stories that I wrote for the Daily Herald back then (such a different place journalism was in then, such a different place the Daily Herald and the regional Gannett Central Wisconsin Newspapers operation was then. That summer I wrote only one article that had anything to do with Stevens Point, which is where I work now. Today we use part-time stringers out of Point and every other thing they cover has to be good for at least two coverage areas. We hardly cover anything nowadays that is specific to one paper- aint enough people working here for that kind of specialization) and I continued it through my final semester in college, mostly posting up opinion articles and editorials I wrote as the opinion page editor for the Daily Egyptian at Southern Illinois University-Carbondale. Fair Carbondale, the dale of the Carbons, how I miss ye (sometimes). Anyhow...if you want to get to know more of the enigma that is Kyle Means, this is a good place to start.

http://dameanestblog.blogspot.com/

A new day in the WIAA

Hate linking to my newspaper blog because of the way we host it, but this is for anyone who's ever followed high school football in Wisconsin. Drastic, DRASTIC realignment may be on the way.

Take a look at my breakdown of the proposal by the Wisconsin Interscholastic Athletic Association to re-organized the group's seven divisions into enrollment-specific districts. With this new way of doing things many decade-old conferences and rivalries just as old could be wiped out for the future.

*Clever sports reference*: WIAA football may never be the same again

Clearing out the bookmarks

Roundup of stuff I've kept bookmarked on my computer for too long and now have to let out here even though they are already dated. Enjoy:

One link and another, better one of LeBron being dunked on.




Really a trip how this turned out to be such a big bit of nothing. Nike and LeBron played themselves with the cover-up, making this whole getting dunked on thing bigger than it ever needed to be. In the end this was just a wasted flexing of corporate muscle. Good thing the swooshers can't control NBA footage or we'd have missed out on memorable moments such as those to the right.

I liked this Michael Silver story as well, it tells about the unlikely burgeoning relationship between Chad Ochocinco (I will try my hardest to make sure I can write that name as much as possible on this blog) and Denzel Washington (or as his increasingly aging female fanbase would say Denzel!).

Its good that someone has taken an interest in molding Ochocinco as a man cause he needs it, when he is able to fully measure his abilities as a football player with his abilities as an entertainer he's as interesting a figure as there is in sports. Sure, who the hell wants to be stuck in Cincinnati but Chad has a chance to be a hall of fame player- don't ruin that, cause it looks like that ring aint coming.

More NFL as we get closer and closer to training camps opening (Oh, boy! (c) John Witherspoon) — the changes in the NFL draft programming format.


I can get with this, I usually have to watch NBC's Thursday lineup (Office and 30 Rock in particular) on Hulu anyway because of work so I'm not worried about what runs up against the draft. What sucks though is that it changes the whole weekend culture of watching the draft nonstop on what would have otherwise been a lazy Saturday afternoon (also occasionally checking in on Sunday). Now a lot of people might be working during the draft, including a co-worker of mine who for years has had an all-day party at his place for the first day of the draft. People will adapt but I think a lot more people will have to settle for checking in updates for the picks while their boss isn't looking or worse, being forced to tune in during commercial breaks of "Grey's Anatomy." (My married brothas, don't give in).

Coming soon

More of that goodness...the Resurrection of "The Official"

Verse One:
I stagger in the gathering possessed by a patter-in
That be scatterin
Over the globe will my vocals be travellin
Unravellin my abdomen it's slime that's babblin
Grammatics that are masculine
I grab them in, verbally badgerin broads
I wish that Madelline, was back on Video LP
I went against all odds and got a even steven
Proceed to read and not believin everything I'm readin
But my brain was bleedin, needin feedin, and exercise
I didn't seek the best of buys, it's a lie to textualize
I analyze where I rest my eyes
And chastise the best of guys with punchlines
I'm Nestle when it's Crunch-time
For your mind like one time
If poetry was pussy I'd be sunshine
cause I deliver like the Sun-Times
Confined in once-mines on dumb rhymes I combine
I'm hype like I'm unsigned, my diet I unswine
Eatin beef sometimes I try to cut back on that shit
This rap shit is truly outta control
My style is too developed to be arrested
It's the freestyle, so now it's out on parole
They tried to hold my soul in a holding cell so I would sell
I bonded with a break and had enough to make bail
A misdemeanor fell on his knee for the jury
I asked No for his ID and the judge thought there was two of me
Motion for a recess to retest my fingerprints
They relinquished since, cause I was guilty in a sense

Verse Two:
I ride the rhythm like a Schwinn bike when in dim light
I use insight to enlight devices hit the skin tight
Words of wisdom wail from my windpipe
Imaginations in flight
I send light, like Ben's kite I've been bright
Get open like on gym nights
And in fights I send rights
Don't hook with skins my friends like
I spend nights up in dykes
In spite I've been indicted as a freak of all trades
I got it made
I bathe in basslines, rinse in riffs, dry in drums
Come from a tribe of bums
Hooked on negro and mums
Had to halt with the, malt liquor
Cause off the malt liquor I fought niggaz
Now my speech is lost quicker
Cruisin Southside streets with no heat and no sticker
U Ak got my back and we don't get no thicker
U Ak got my back and we don't get no thicker
U Ak got my back and we don't now check it
I'm a hoe but not a hoe nigga, ain't scared of no nigga
But it's my turn to go I gotta go
And I'm gone with the storm